Administration Denies Keystone XL Pipeline

“The State Department has decided the Keystone XL Pipeline would not serve the national interests of the United States”, said President Obama.

By squashing the Keystone XL pipeline, President Obama saved the property rights of homeowners and at least 90 family farms that lie along the proposed path. Republicans touted the project as a job creator, often making claims it would create as many as 42,000 jobs.

The decision was largely based on worldwide politics, coming less than a month before the president goes to Paris for global climate talks.

The project prompted opposition from Native American tribes, a few landowners and environmental groups who were concerned the pipeline would contaminate water supplies and contribute to pollution.

Stopping the Keystone XL pipeline is a necessary, but nowhere-near-sufficient, step in protecting our planet for future generations.

This president’s fixation on climate change – and his acquiescence to left-wing Democrats and environmentalists willing to chain themselves to the White House fence in protest – trumped all of the positive features of the pipeline.

The Keystone XL project would have linked existing pipeline networks in Canada and the U.S. to bring crude oil from Alberta, and also a few from North Dakota, to refineries in IL. Tar sands oil is a few of the most expensive in the world to produce – and shipping crude by rail to the Gulf costs twice as much as by pipeline. The pipeline would not lower gas prices for American consumers.

Nor would the pipeline create meaningful, lasting jobs.

The cross-border project required federal approval, and although the State Department had determined that building Keystone XL would have minimal environmental impacts, TransCanada appeared to face an uphill battle.

The company’s Chief Executive Russ Girling called Obama’s decision “misplaced symbolism”, but a few are advising the TransCanada take a more muted approach until the 2016 elections come to an end.

Representative Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin) reacted, “The President’s rejection of the Keystone XL oil pipeline is yet another example of his radical personal agenda getting in the way of what’s best for the country”.

“I urged the president to take climate change into account with his decision, and I’m pleased that global warming was the driving factor in his rejection of TransCanada Corp.’s request”.

Many analysts now say the company already has turned toward domestic production, such as bolstering its own Energy East pipeline project, set to send 1.1 million barrels each day to Canada’s east coast, Reuters said. “It’d have about an $8 billion economic impact”.

While Keystone was symbolic, it was also a real project, a legitimate proposal for the efficient transport of a valuable and critical resource so it could enter the global market.