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Obama Rejects Keystone XL Pipeline (washingtonpost.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The Keystone XL pipeline controversy is finally coming to a close. On Friday, President Obama denied a construction permit for the pipeline, ending a seven-year political fight. Obama said, "America's now a global leader when it comes to taking serious action to fight climate change. And frankly, approving this project would have undercut that global leadership. And that's the biggest risk we face — not acting." Secretary of State John Kerry added, "The reality is that this decision could not be made solely on the numbers — jobs that would be created, dirty fuel that would be transported here, or carbon pollution that would ultimately be unleashed. The United States cannot ask other nations to make tough choices to address climate change if we are unwilling to make them ourselves." The decision comes as no surprise to the oil industry, and they've been busily working on other ways to transport the oil. "U.S. imports of oil from Canada hit a record high of 3.4 million barrels a day in August, up from just under 2 million barrels a day in 2008, the year the pipeline was proposed."
It's not about reality, it's about perception. It doesn't matter which pollutes more only which is perceived to be worse.
Stupid name. Keystone. Like the cops. Shuda called it Patriot Pipe.
Obama denys the permit a few days after transcanada requests to table the permit process (due to falling oil prices) and everyone cheers.
It's notable that Obama is making a political calculation (wanting to retain "leadership" relating to climate change, the pipeline not increasing "energy security") rather than an economic or environmental one.
Reading his statement on the matter, his economic justifications are irrelevant ("the pipeline wouldn't create jobs or lower gas prices for Americans"): since it's not proposed that the US government pay for the pipeline, these issues are only relevant against costs -- and he doesn't discuss any costs! He isn't citing the direct environmental damage of digging the pipeline and creating associated infrastructure (roads, power cables, pumping stations etc). He isn't citing the risk of leaks.
I was wondering if Obama would claim climate risks since that would have required him to quantify his estimate of the accuracy of the models used to predict the climate effects of the pipeline. But naturally he didn't claim risks to the climate -- only risks to US leadership on climate issues. That's a fair reason to make national-level decisions, but is not a win for the environment.
Is the technology required to build an oil refinery beyond the societal abilities of Canada? Do they really need to freeride off the USA even more than they already do?
Is it too much to ask that TransCanada build a Canadian pipeline transversing Canada to their own Canadian refinery, thereby securing all the supposed economic benefits for their own country?
Fuck Canada!
You're confused, if a pipeline breaks they turn the pumps off and fix it. Crude oil, being 100% natural, gets broken down by bacteria that eat it. We already have huge, huge volume of oil and petroleum products going through massive pipe system, look it up.
Nature already polluted all of this sand with oil. All the oil companies are doing is removing the oil leaving nice clean sand behind.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
You do know the keystone pipeline would raise the cost of oil and lessen the supply to the industries you quote right?
What the lobbyists who produce this information and fancy commercials and radio talk shows don't tell you is where this oil is going?
It is not going to you. It is going to cars in China who are used to paying $9 a gallon for gas. If all of North America's gas could be sold for %300 why would they sell it to you, or fertilizer, plastic, electrical, or medical companies? Unless you want to pay $7 a gallon for gas of course.
This is why Obama vetoed it. We have all the liability of a potential accident with less product.
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You're all wrong and kind of stupid while you're at it.
This pipeline was going to a specific place for a specific reason, and that reason was not to benefit the American people. It is illegal to export US crude oil overseas. It is not illegal to export Canadian crude though. Additionally, Canada doesn't have a lot of the kinds of refineries that can handle that garbage tar sand stuff they dig up because that requires a level of environmental unfriendliness uncommon even for refineries. Of course the US deep south has those because God's will or something.
This pipeline was to terminate in one of those "foreign free trade zones" where companies don't pay taxes on exports. The entire purpose of it was to allow a Canadian company to export crude and/or products refined from that crude overseas through the US, with US citizens bearing the brunt of the environmental cost of dealing with the pipeline and taking the environmental risk processing what even for crude oil is a very dirty raw material. It would not have lowered gas prices in the US because the oil would not have stayed in the US. This was all about using ignorant people to fund a for-profit project essentially for free when all was said and done.
The only thing Obama screwed up is that he let it go on this long. Actually, forget about the environmental issues because nobody's ever going to convince some of you that it's ever a problem. Anybody responsibly running a country would have laughed this out of his office the day it came in there simply on economic terms. What kind of person in charge of anything would deliberately take on a bunch of risk for no reward? Cleanups cost money and something like this is pretty much guaranteed to need one at some point. Nobody who has any brains in business would take that on--of course that's exactly what business wanted the US government to do in this case. However, Obama had to pander to the ignorant masses, and unfortunately the facts of this story take longer to relay than the attention span of a toddler, which is what most Americans and especially most conservatives have these days.
"The decision comes as no surprise to the oil industry, and they've been busily working on other ways to transport the oil."
Like, for instance, the railroad that Obama's 1%'er buddy Warren Buffett owns. I'm sure there's no connection there, though.
Oh, and is it cleaner to transport by rail?
http://bigstory.ap.org/article...
Nope.
And is it going to cut carbon emissions? Are we pretending that Canada's just going to leave it in the ground if we don't buy it?
Do you have ESP?
The just flat our refuse all evidence, even with the worst case scenarios accidents at Chernobyl and Fukashima, the millions of lives saved by using nuclear power. And this is with the handicap their efforts have wrought by preventing the adoption of new designs and technology to the point where we are planning on running reactors until they are 80 years old. Imagine if we were on 6th or 7th generation reactors? Imagine if we were allowed to use breeder reactors? Nobody would be talking about using fossil fuels for electricity production.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
A couple actual facts, and yes, to begin, this has nothing to do with the environment. Over the past few years US crude productions has risen sharply and imports have fallen dramatically. This has caused the price of crude to fall to level where exploration cannot be supported. All the oil companies are cutting back on exploration, some are exiting all together selling their leases. Politics, for instance, had nothing to do with shell pulling out of the arctic. It was that the arctic is still very expensive, and at $40 a barrel, no one is making money. Second, the pipeline is a conservative nightmare on many levels. Primarily it requires the US federal governement to take land from US citizens and give it to a foreign corporations. Many citizen land owners in Texas and other very conservative states have sued for their right to keep their land and not have it annexed to a foreign country, but the conservative courts have said that the landowners do not have the right. Finally there is the simple matter of production. The US has enough crude to refine. The pipeline made some sense when oil was high as there was going to be money to be made so investing in infrastructure made sense. Now, again, with crude at 40, there is no money to be made. However there is money to be lost. Oil refining has a lot of external costs in terms of health care costs, falling property values around the refinery, and yes, environmental destruction. The Canadians know this which is why they are outsourcing refining to their hick neighbors to the south instead of building infrastructure themselves and reaping the rewards of the alleged profit that comes with it.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
There's no issue here. Keystone was just a way for Canada to get it's oil to China cheaply. There's no benefit besides a few hundred jobs. OTOH there's a strong likelihood that sooner or later the pipeline will burst and spew oil everywhere for days. We here in America don't have the best track record of making oil companies clean up their messes....
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More likely billionaire campaign contributor Tom Steyer is happy. The liberals keep talking about the Koch brothers ruining politics, but it's Stryker and George Soros who are the real threat.
Who benefits most from the pipeline? TransCanada. All the pipeline does is make is easier and cheaper to ship oil from the tar sands. There will be some jobs to build the pipeline but after that only a handful to maintain it. The problem is the US will spends billions to build it. Will it increase refinery capacity? No. Will it make it easier to extract oil from the tar sands? No. Do US refineries benefit from getting more oil? No as most of the oil will be simply shipped out of the Gulf of Mexico to Europe. So the only purpose of the pipeline was so that TransCanada saves money on shipping at the expense of the US.
Then there is the possible environmental problems. Pipelines leak. If there is an incident with a train or truck, the impact is much less than a pipeline spilling millions of gallons of oil somewhere in the US when it is used.
Then there is the economic aspect of extracting oil from the tar sands. At the current gas prices, it's not economical to get oil from the tar sands. So when gas prices are low, the pipeline won't even be used. So the US is paying for a half-used pipeline.
So the US pays a lot of money so that TransCanada saves money on shipping. When it is in use, there is a greater chance of environmental impact. When it is not being used, the US paid a lot of money so TransCanada didn't save money. There was no real economic advantage to it at all.
If TransCanada wants to build the pipeline with 100% of their own money, they can do it. Don't do it with US taxpayer money.
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The Koch bros must be mighty pissed off right about now.
Maybe it'll pop your bubble, but they're probably delighted, given that they have big investments in the rail transport system that's profiting hugely from transporting oil. As someone once said, "If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."
You're all wrong and kind of stupid while you're at it.
Yes, you are, we're about to see why in a second...
This pipeline was to terminate in one of those "foreign free trade zones" where companies don't pay taxes on exports.
Neither the US nor Canada tax exports. At all. The reason for the use of the foreign free trade zone is to REDUCE costs to the US Government, saving it money. The law says that if I import goods from a foreign country (say, oil) I pay an import tax on it. When I use that good to create a new good/product and export the resuts, I can claim back the import taxes I paid on the original imported goods. Meaning the US Government must inspect, assess, and then collect payment. And then must process a claim for tax return, process, and pay back out.
By using a foreign free trade zone, product is not taxed when it arrives - and it must be exported abroad. The net tax result is zero - same as in the original case. But CBP doesn't have to process each transaction twice - eliminating the expense/overhead related to a zero-gain transaction.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
I would rather we spent the money on useful construction jobs, like repairing our failing bridges (http://blogs.wsj.com/experts/2015/06/04/how-a-decaying-infrastructure-hurts-u-s-manufacturing/).
No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.
Which means...you run longer trains and more of them. And let's see, if each tank car has a 10^-whatever chance of derailing per mile traveled, what happens when there's more cars, more trains, and more wear on the tracks. Does the chance of derailment get bigger or smaller. This is not a trick question.
When America quits importing oil from the world market, that drives down the demand, which with the current supply on the world market, with more coming, it would drive down prices. This is called the laws of supply and demand. .07/kwh, it would require oil to drop to less than 20/brl to equal that. IOW, electricity is DIRT cheap, compared to oil.
Secondly, the prices of oil in America are actually QUITE low. If you compare brent (roughly international) with WTI (west texas with better grade oil compared to brent), you will find that WTI is 10/brl LESS. Why less? Because our costs are pretty darn low as well as our supply is greater than our demand.
Now, if America quits importing oil, then you can bet that global prices will plummet even further. And with average nighttime electricity prices in America at
And If America is moving quickly to much lower costs electricity and nat gas on our vehicles, china will go ballistic and work hard to drop their imports of oil.
IOW, by focusing on our burning of oil, rather than one location of where it comes from, the dems COULD have caused the world wide drop of CO2 over the next 5 years. This is why dems are SOOO foolish.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I would rather we spent the money on useful construction jobs, like repairing our failing bridges
Since "the money" would have come from the oil industry, there is 0% chance of it being spent on repairing bridges. More likely, it will be spent on pipelines to carry Canadian oil to the Pacific coast, so it can be shipped to China.
This is a victory for political symbolism over reality.
Buffett runs the trains and has a share in the oil.
This hurts him not at all. Do you think that the oil *isn't* going to be brought up because of the failure of the pipeline?
I don't know if Keystone was good or bad for the US in general, but the only thing that's a real threat to the oil sands exploitation is low priced Saudi oil. It's still profitable to truck and ship that oil because it is oil and everyone needs it.
I think there is some sort of odd belief that the oil has been "stopped". You can't stop oil production without a better alternative. If anyone thought this was a "win" for alternative fuels, they are mistaken. The only people who may have benefited are the people who don't lose their land and who could, in theory, have to deal with the aquifer if there was a spill. You don't stop oil production by trying to stop transport of oil already drilled. Too many people need it and will ensure it gets where it needs to go.
Frankly, I think it would have been a marginal win for the environmentalists to let the pipeline go in. Trucks and trains are a definite pollution and carbon issue, whereas a spill is a theoretical risk while the oil would have been transported without the waste of the trucks and trains. I think this is NIMBY "environmentalism" at work.
See article 1, section, clause 5 of the US Constitution - "No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State." Thus there are zero export taxes in the US. It's not like it's hard to find the export tax rates for countries. And it's not hard to learn about foreign free trade zones in the US. But hey, I know it's just facts and reality - don't let that stop you from your little, delusional rant! Education is a terrible thing when you have an agenda to push...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
If TransCanada wants to build the pipeline with 100% of their own money, they can do it. Don't do it with US taxpayer money.
What on earth gave you the idea US taxpayer money was being used to build this pipeline, and not TC's capital? Wow, guess I haven't read the craziest of the anti-KXL propaganda...
"The oil will be used regardless."
Oil will be used, THAT very expensive and polluting to extract oil will likely not be as long as the oil prices stay below what it costs to develop the tar sands.
And jobs aren't *that* important. There are MANY things I'd rather not do despite what ever jobs they might create. Like restart slavery, or have government funded turd polishers, etc. There has to be a line drawn somewhere. The Keystone XL pipeline was bad for America (except for the many GOP Congresspeople who were investors in TransCanada) in EVERY way except for the bullshit 'jobs' excuse, which was a weak excuse to begin with.
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