Pickens's Windmills Tilt Against Market Realities

Texas Oilman's Plan for Renewable Energy Faces Strong Headwinds as Oil Prices Subside and the Credit Crisis Makes Landfall

By NEIL KING JR.
Wall Street Journal

Washington

He boasts his own self-declared army and the support of 13 governors, 53 congressmen and 180 mayors, along with the Sierra Club and the American Lung Association. He has plugged his cause on countless news shows and spent $60 million of his own money on a massive ad spree.

Now T. Boone Pickens is about to find out which has more oomph: all of the above, or a $100 drop in the price of oil.

The flinty Dallas billionaire is going all out to sell lawmakers and the next administration on his plan to wean the U.S. off Middle East oil by ramping up the use of wind power and natural gas.

Trouble is, energy markets, and a fair share of skeptics, keep tilting against him.

(More here.)