CHARLESTON — Pat McGeehan was only 15 when he stood in a flight line near Spokane, Wash., with his mother and the two gazed in horror at the crash of a B-52 bomber that killed his father, Col. Mark McGeehan.
Just a few years later, the surviving son saw himself thrust into combat situations in volatile Afghanistan.
From such experiences has grown a new lawmaker determined to help America grow energy self-reliant.
The fateful crash that robbed him of his father and his combat days in the Middle East have inspired McGeehan to produce his first bill — one he hopes can expedite coals to liquid theory into commercial and practical use.
“I guess you can say that I’ve been exposed to tragedy and death for a great period of time,” he told the House in a floor speech Tuesday.
Life so far has taught him that America, in the past three decades, has imported foreign oil and exported soldiers.
“Oil is a valuable commodity,” McGeehan, R-Hancock, said. “It’s in our national interest to protect that valuable commodity. Our country runs basically on oil. Any type of foreign country that controls a great amount of crude oil would also have the wealth to invest in biological and chemicals technology.”
McGeehan reminded the House only two places in the world have commercial coal to liquids technology in use — South Africa and a site in Central Europe.
With the Air Force targeting 2015 as the deadline for relying on coal to liquids fuel to supply half its needs, even with the newest line of aircraft, McGeehan urged support of his bill to expedite the process in West Virginia.
Specifics of his legislation were not disclosed, but the lawmaker said the technology exists to produce the equivalent of crude at $45 a barrel.
“I just want to emphasize we have a unique opportunity here in West Virginia,” he said.
“West Virginia could be at the forefront of this technology. We have the vision. We have the technology. It’s viable. We just need to make it happen.”
McGeehan said a commercial coal-to-liquids plant could pump out 30,000 barrels a day at one plant, providing 2,000 permanent jobs.
Additionally, it would translate into between 4,000 and 8,000 construction and contracting jobs to erect the physical plant.
“We have a unique situation right now to make it happen,” McGeehan said. “We just have to take action.”
McGeehan appealed to all aspects of society — labor, management, all political parties — to see the idea comes to fruition.
Otherwise, he said, the country will remain in the old pattern that finds foreign oil producers dropping the price when coal-to-liquids talk gets serious, then raising it back to $100 a barrel when such discussions begin to cool.
“And once the first plant is in, it’s so much easier for the second, the third and the fourth plant to be in,” he said.
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