T. Boone Pickens Drills into Wind Power
T. Boone Pickens confirmed Thursday that his Mesa Power outfit is placing an order for 667 wind turbines with General Electric , launching a $10 billion effort to build the world's largest wind farm in the Texas Panhandle.
"We have made a deal with GE, and we're scheduled to start receiving turbines starting in the middle of 2010," he said on CNBC's Squawk Box. The initial order with GE will be worth about $2 billion.
"Oil is phasing out, and renewables are coming in. ... I wanted to be in on it," the legendary oil man said. "We'll start to receive the turbines ... starting in the middle of 2010. ... It'll be $8 billion (worth of) turbines, and about $2 billion (in) transmission ... it'll probably even go over $10 billion."
The wind farm would produce 1,000 megawatts of electricity, enough to power about 300,000 homes.
By 2014, Pickens has said he wants to have 4,000 MW of wind. Earlier in the year, Pickens indicated he was willing to back wind projects to the tune of $10 billion.