DORGAN WILL INTRODUCE THE PICKENS ENERGY PLAN CALLING FOR BUILDING AN INTERSTATE TRANSMISSION GRID AND A LARGE EXPANSION OF WIND AND SOLAR ENERGY

Monday, November 10, 2008

CONTACT: Justin Kitsch
or  Brenden Timpe
PHONE: 202-224-2551

(BISMARCK, N.D.) – U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan, a senior member of the Senate Energy Committee said today that he intends to introduce a portion of the energy plan advanced by Texas oil man T. Boone Pickens that would create a national electric transmission grid and a major expansion of wind and solar energy.

“I agree with Mr. Pickens that our country is facing an energy crisis, and we can’t be taking baby steps to solve it.

“We are importing 65 percent of our oil from foreign countries, many of them located in troubled parts of the world. Our American petroleum dollars are ending up in the bank accounts of foreign governments, and, among other things, enough of it is spilling from the oil barrel to finance the terrorist organizations that are a threat to our homeland. All of this holds our country’s economic future hostage to events we can’t control. That has to stop.

“I will introduce part of the Pickens plan in the U.S. Senate calling for the building of a nationwide electric transmission superhighway. It will allow our country to maximize the potential to produce vast wind energy in the heartland from Texas to North Dakota. And it will allow us to develop solar energy from the southwest to California. We can put that electric energy on the transmission superhighway and move it to where it is needed in our country. By maximizing our production and use of renewable energy here at home, we will reduce our need for imported oil.

“North Dakota will play a major role in a robust plan to develop renewable energy, especially wind energy. We are the Saudi Arabia of wind according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

“The portion of the Pickens Plan I will introduce will allow our country to move to alternative transportation vehicles, which will represent a change that will strengthen our country by making us less dependent on foreign oil,” said Dorgan.

Dorgan’s comments came at the Great Plains Energy Expo that he sponsored in Bismarck this week. The Expo attracted over 600 people from across the U.S.

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