George S. May Business Blog

Oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens Jr. can’t get financing?

You know that our economy is in big trouble, when one of the richest men in our country can not get a loan.

“Oil billionaire Thomas Boone Pickens Jr. has dropped plans to build a giant wind farm in the Texas Panhandle.

Pickens, who made much of his fortune buying up oil and gas companies in the 1980s, put off the wind power project because of the difficulty of getting credit for it in the sour economy.

He’d planned a 4,000-megawatt complex that might cost as much as $10 billion, and Mesa Power, his company, has already ordered 667 wind turbines for it, though they won’t be delivered for several years.

 ”The capital markets have dealt us all a setback,” said Pickens in a statement emailed to the San Francisco Business Times through his PR firm. ” (source)

Mr. T. Boone Pickens Jr. did say that although he is scrapping plans for this project he will find projects for the 667 wind turbines that are coming.

So is the Pampa project scrapped for good?

T. Boone Pickens Jr.’s answer:

“I expect to continue development of the Pampa project, but not at the pace that I originally expected”.

Pickens has been a huge supporter of reducing our country’s dependence on foreign oil for some time now. He’s put forward plans for widespread use of natural gas vehicles, as well as pushing for wind power.

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