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Vol. 231 No. 9 |
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| NELL LUKOSAVICH, ASSOCIATE EDITOR |
Matt Simmons: The Elephant’s Child of the energy industry
There is no question Matt Simmons was a man of many words, words spoken with both conviction and fervor. Likened to the curious main character of Rudyard Kipling’s The Elephant’s Child, Simmons, who passed away on Aug. 8 at the age of 67, leaves behind a legacy of asking questions and making his actions speak louder than his words.
In his 1902 tale, Kipling chronicles the adventures of a young elephant who, while castigated for always questioning everything around him, kept asking “questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt, or smelt, or touched.” The Elephant’s Child concludes: “I keep six honest serving-men: (They taught me all I knew). Their names are What and Where and When and How and Why and Who.” Simmons, a real-life Elephant’s Child, began his journey of insatiable curiosity as a young man in school.
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Matt Simmons in Camden, Maine, on July 2, 2010, during an interview by a German film crew about the BP spill.
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After graduating cum laude from the University of Utah, Simmons received an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School. His professor, Wickham Skinner, remembers his pupil vividly as a good student who spoke up a lot. Simmons later became Skinner’s research assistant and they wrote two case books, one of which introduced Simmons to the oil industry. Skinner said, “In researching the case study, he would dig for facts, [analyze] numbers, charts and trends. He had an extraordinary way to put together the big picture.” Skinner also introduced Simmons to Maine, a place for which he would develop a great passion throughout his life.
After being deeply moved by the energy crisis of 1974, Simmons co-founded Simmons & Company International, a small energy investment group. By 1981, the company grew from a four-person operation to a burgeoning 13-employee business. While the company continued to grow and diversify into upstream, downstream and alternative energy ventures, Simmons served as energy adviser to George W. Bush during his 2000 presidential campaign and began researching data about the state of the world’s energy reserves.
In 2005, Simmons published Twilight in the Desert, which claimed that Middle Eastern oil fields had hit peak production. He dedicated the book to his Harvard professor, Wick Skinner. Sadad Al Husseini, former Saudi Aramco executive VP and member of the board, remembers, “I was fortunate to meet Matt in Arabia years before he issued [Twilight] and we became great friends even though we sometimes agreed to disagree ... I was very impressed by Matt’s determination to master all aspects of the energy industry and his diligent research where it mattered.”
Simmons, an avid watercolorist, was involved in numerous global and local humanitarian and cultural projects. In 2005, Simmons restored The Strand Theatre in Rockland, Maine, thereby creating a new cultural platform in the community. “He really had a vision when he bought [The Strand]. It was so beautiful—even featured in Architectural Digest. He had an astonishing range and depth of interests,” acclaimed photographer Peter Ralston remembers.
Believing that it was a crucial time to implement an alternative energy solution, Simmons founded the Ocean Energy Institute (OEI) in 2007 as a venture capital fund and a brain trust of global energy experts. After studying the opportunities of wind energy with his colleagues, Simmons worked to establish a commercially viable offshore wind farm that could be used as the model for a global offshore energy infrastructure. The project caught the attention of the local universities, state legislature and governor of Maine. “Matt was passionate about OEI and truly believed that wind energy was the answer,” said Herman Franssen, president of International Energy Associates.
It was clear to all who knew Simmons that he was deeply saddened and frustrated by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. While he courageously voiced his disdain over the cause of the spill and its long-term impact on the environment, Simmons established a scholarship fund for the children of the 11 men who lost their lives on the Deepwater Horizon.
While Simmons’ passion for renewable offshore resources will continue to live on through OEI, by all accounts, his greatest source of inspiration came from his five daughters. Each of them has pursued different careers in social work, entrepreneurial business, photojournalism and education, memorializing their father’s hard work, relentless quest for knowledge and compassion for others. “Dad was a giant in all of our lives ... Yes, [I] was always aware of his career, but he was always just my loving, cheery and warm dad first,” said Simmons’ daughter Abby.
Kipling concludes the The Elephant’s Child with the words, “One million Hows, two million Wheres, and seven million Whys!” While Simmons will never know the answers to the many questions he raised, he has taught a whole new generation to embrace its insatiable curiosity.
“He saw things in the world that others could not see, and built businesses around them and educated people about them. He saw things in people that the individuals might not see for themselves, and valued them and gave them opportunities to excel,” said Bob West, managing director of OEI. “He so often expressed joy and exuberance in life, in people, in opportunity, in any situation. In his own words, that I heard so often after some meeting or event, ‘Wasn’t that just fabulous?’” 
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