Keystone pipeline: TransCanada reapplies after changing route
![The TransCanada pipeline project. | AP Photo The TransCanada pipeline project. | AP Photo](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20121109220539im_/http://images.politico.com/global/2012/05/120504_keystone_ap.jpg)
As expected, TransCanada reapplied Friday for a presidential permit for its Keystone XL pipeline.
The company’s application covers the stretch of the proposed pipeline from the U.S.-Canadian border in Montana to Steele City, Neb. TransCanada will supplement the application once an alternative route is selected within Nebraska.
Continue Reading"Our application for a presidential permit builds on more than three years of environmental review already conducted for Keystone XL," TransCanada President and CEO Russ Girling said in a press release. "It was the most comprehensive process ever for a cross-border pipeline and that work should allow our cross-border permit to be processed expeditiously and a decision made once a new route in Nebraska is determined."
Federal environmental reviews have concluded that the pipeline would have minimal impact.
But concern in Nebraska over the state’s environmentally sensitive Sandhills region and uproar by environmental activists in opposition to the entire pipeline has pushed back approval of a presidential permit until at least 2013.
President Barack Obama rejected granting a permit in January after congressional Republicans forced his hand by including a 60-day deadline for a decision in a must-pass payroll tax cut extension plan in December.
He subsequently touted and pledged to expedite permits for the southern route of the pipeline — connecting oil fields in Cushing, Okla., to Texas refineries — which doesn’t require a presidential permit.
This article first appeared on POLITICO Pro at 10:23 a.m. on May 4, 2012.
Readers' Comments (10)
This is the right way this should be done instead of Repubs politicizing it.
They submit a proposal for where they want to take. The State Department studies it, then approves it if it is appropriate. The original path was rejected by the people of Nebraska including the Republicans there! All the State Dept wanted was to study a new proposal instead of pre-approving it like we did during the bad credit days as Repubs wanted in their Bill.
Remember that in TransCanada's initial application their stated goal on the XL pipeline was NOT to benefit America or to supply tar sands for US refineries or to create jobs for Americans. Instead, their goal from the start has been to raise the price of the dirty Canadian tar sands for world markets and to bring more profit to TransCanada NOT America.
Notice that when Republicans were pressured to make sure that the XL pipeline was construction by US steel, that the relatively few temporary jobs (not the hundreds of thousands that Boehner lies about) created during construction and the few hundred permanent jobs would go to Americans, and that the tar sands would go to America rather than being shipped overseas to China, India, etc., Republicans opposed it in their blind allegiance to the rich and polluting energy and chemical companies. Recall that the tar sands are the dirtiest (even moreso than dirty coal) fossil fuel and the costliest and most energy-demanding to refine. It took oil to reach $100 per barrel to make profitable and TransCanada avoided opposition in their own country for a shorter route to the West Coast across Canada by counting on American and Republican greed over the environment.
There is also never any mention of the owners of a half-million American farms and ranches that the XL pipeline must cross thanks to the GOP-SCOTUS-backed "eminent domain" laws that literally allow the rich and corporations to take advantage of and overpower individual homeowners. In brief, the pipeline benefits the few at the expense of the many.
thanks to the GOP-SCOTUS-backed "eminent domain" laws
After more than 3 years of studying this, you would think that it would be approved quite rapidly. But, I'm guessing it won't be any sooner than 1 day after the election. The unions may not like it, but they realize the will need to take one for the team, so Obama can pander to the Enviromentalists.
If the liar in chief doesn't approve this permit he will lose his job because of it. He has already shown America that he's a far left liberal and the USA is not a far left country. He's got a problem with a lack of truth telling and as every day goes by he isolates himself farther from the mainstream electorate.
What is Obama's problem? If it's worth building, then it's worth building now and not after campaign season. He makes everything political. Why did he keep gas prices high after the BP spill? Normally prices would have floated back down like they did after Katrina and other events in Bush's time. If the media can blame Bush for gas spikes, they ought to have the integrity to do the same to Obama. I know, they're biased and they won't.
I hope Keystone succeeds eventually. Domestic oil means jobs, a growing economy, and lower cost of living. Especially after the exposure a couple months ago of Obama's domestic oil exports in the past three years (found at CNN Money) at a time that our domestic gas prices are so high, one must wonder what Obama's really going for. If he cared about the economy or jobs, he'd lift the oil-drilling moratorium still existing today on federal lands, accept Keystone, and allow domestic oil to be used domestically. Prices would plummet, we would have spending money! If on the other hand, this is about the environment as he'd like you to believe, why do you believe we're saving the environment when we're instead buying oil from distant, hostile, human-rights violating countries with less stringent environmental standards then our own? That doesn't fly. It must be the ensuing economic hardship driving citizens of the United States to turn to their government instead of relying on themselves. He's buying votes with dependency for his reelection, after which we'll make a swift and seemingly natural transition to socialism despite the failure of socialism everywhere it's been tried. Do you really want to follow in the footsteps of the EU? Our debt per capita exceeds that of Greece already, and our deficit is greater than our GDP. We can't afford more of Obama.
Just shut up! Obama does not want Americans to have jobs and he does not want us to have affordable gas. He wants you to put algae in your tank.
For the good of the country, let's hope President Obama has the courage to 'flip flop' on this one.
Whats more stupid: 1) digging up the tar, mixing the tar with a ton of toxic chemicals to make the tar flow, piping the tar over a thousand miles over aquifers and across fresh water rivers and lakes, removing the toxic chemicals to ship the oil to China?
Algae is being grown right next to the power plant, ethanol plant, and plastics manufacturer. No digging, shipping, no piping, no added toxic chemicals right now and competitive right now with oil. Millions of permanent jobs can be created with 'making our own oil (oil and tar are old algae) across the US.
This waste and poisoning of American natural resources with obsolete technology is mind-numbing stupid. But the republicans and the tea party are 'playing politics' with America. I do hope the 99% can break this logjam on American home-grown algae oil to be used for fuel, power, and producing plastics, preferably bio plastics. Other advantages are connecting the algae plants to product fuel/oil/gas/plastics/cosmetics/livestock feed to a municipal waste water system. Get this, the algae cleans the waste water while making algae oil.. Millions of jobs and reduced dependence on foreign oil which would greatly help to reduce our national debt.
The biggest difference is oil is actually a proven, affordable energy reserve while algae isn't. One works and one is a pipe dream of the left.
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