Don’t overlook problems; they’re opportunities
In this edition of Texas Inc., our columnist Chris Tomlinson visits the sad irony that some of the world’s largest oil producing regions will be the most affected by rising global temperatures. He cites research projecting that heat indexes in some of these regions will routinely exceed 165 degrees by 2070.
People don’t last more than six hours in heat like that. It will make large parts of the earth inhospitable. “Millions of residents of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates will need to leave their homes by the end of the century if global temperatures continue rising at the current pace,” Tomlinson writes.
Houston, to say the least, will be hotter, too. But let’s face it: The world runs on fossil fuels, and the transition to alternatives is moving along slowly.
Also in this edition of Texas Inc., energy reporter Jordan Blum sits down with Marathon Oil CEO Lee Tillman, who has positioned his company as a leading player in the shale formations of Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and North Dakota.
Cheap, cleaner-burning natural gas is part of the global effort to reduce greenhouse gases. Because gas leaks put methane into the air, it’s not without its controversies, but our nation’s gas supply has made us a lot more energy independent. This is a trend that is likely to benefit us for years to come.
“Between our two most mature assets — the Bakken and the Eagle Ford — at our current 2019 activity levels, we talk about having about a decade or so of inventory left,” Tillman said.
In business, it’s important to remember that problems, no matter how daunting, bring opportunities, whether that’s climate change or something more personal.
Also, in this edition we present the story of a young entrepreneur, Shaun Noorian, who injured his back lifting a chunk of metal at oilfield-services company Schlumberger. His doctor soon discovered that he had a hormone disorder. And this motivated him to start his own compounding pharmacy, which today serves about 200,000 patients and physicians.
Another problem for Noorian in starting his business was our nation’s dysfunctional health care system. As a result, his company, Empower Pharmacy, does not work with insurance companies. Instead, it prices many of its drugs around the price of a typical patient copayment.
“The current model is too corrupt to fix,” he says. “It’s broken. So we have a different model.”
There’s a solution for every problem. Sometimes it just takes a better business mind to find it.
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