tagged w/ Keystone XL pipeline
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So, who does Keystone XL benefit? TransCanada, and US investors. As the Cornell study shows, for you and me, it’s all a huge pipe dream. Or nightmare; you decide...
http://veracitystew.com/?p=35857So, who does Keystone XL benefit? TransCanada, and US investors. As the Cornell study... more
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If we’re going to tell this story — and it’s the most important story of our time — we’re going to have to tell it ourselves.
by Bill McKibben, via TomDispatch
The Williams River was so languid and lovely last Saturday morning that it was almost impossible to imagine the violence with which it must have been running on August 28, 2011. And yet the evidence was all around: sand piled high on its banks, trees still scattered as if by a giant’s fist, and most obvious of all, a utilitarian temporary bridge where for 140 years a graceful covered bridge had spanned the water.
The YouTube video of that bridge crashing into the raging river was Vermont’s iconic image from its worst disaster in memory, the record flooding that followed Hurricane Irene’s rampage through the state in August 2011. It claimed dozens of lives, as it cut more than a billion-dollar swath of destruction across the eastern United States.
I watched it on TV in Washington just after emerging from jail, having been arrested at the White House during mass protests of the Keystone XL pipeline. Since Vermont’s my home, it took the theoretical — the ever more turbulent, erratic, and dangerous weather that the tar sands pipeline from Canada would help ensure — and made it all too concrete. It shook me bad.
And I’m not the only one.
New data released last month by researchers at Yale and George Mason universities show that a lot of Americans are growing far more concerned about climate change, precisely because they’re drawing the links between freaky weather, a climate kicked off-kilter by a fossil-fuel guzzling civilization, and their own lives. After a year with a record number of multi-billion dollar weather disasters, seven in ten Americans now believe that “global warming is affecting the weather.” No less striking, 35% of the respondents reported that extreme weather had affected them personally in 2011. As Yale’s Anthony Laiserowitz told the New York Times, “People are starting to connect the dots.”
Which is what we must do. As long as this remains one abstract problem in the long list of problems, we’ll never get to it. There will always be something going on each day that’s more important, including, if you’re facing flood or drought, the immediate danger.
But in reality, climate change is actually the biggest thing that’s going on every single day. If we could only see that pattern we’d have a fighting chance. It’s like one of those trompe l’oeil puzzles where you can only catch sight of the real picture by holding it a certain way. So this weekend we’ll be doing our best to hold our planet a certain way so that the most essential pattern is evident. At 350.org, we’re organizing a global day of action that’s all about dot-connecting; in fact, you can follow the action at climatedots.org.
The day will begin in the Marshall Islands of the far Pacific, where the sun first rises on our planet, and where locals will hold a daybreak underwater demonstration on their coral reef already threatened by rising seas. They’ll hold, in essence, a giant dot — and so will our friends in Bujumbura, Burundi, where March flooding destroyed 500 homes. In Dakar, Senegal, they’ll mark the tidal margins of recent storm surges. In Adelaide, Australia, activists will host a “dry creek regatta” to highlight the spreading drought down under.
Pakistani farmers — some of the millions driven from their homes by unprecedented flooding over the last two years — will mark the day on the banks of the Indus; in Ayuthaya, Thailand, Buddhist monks will protest next to a temple destroyed by December’s epic deluges that also left the capital, Bangkok, awash.
Activists in Ulanbataar will focus on the ongoing effects of drought in Mongolia. In Daegu, South Korea, students will gather with bags of rice and umbrellas to connect the dots between climate change, heavy rains, and the damage caused to South Korea’s rice crop in recent years. In Amman, Jordan, Friends of the Earth Middle East will be forming a climate dot on the shores of the Dead Sea to draw attention to how climate-change-induced drought has been shrinking that sea.
In Herzliya, Israel, people will form a dot on the beach to stand in solidarity with island nations and coastal communities around the world that are feeling the impact of climate change. In newly freed Libya, students will hold a teach-in. In Oman, elders will explain how the weather along the Persian Gulf has shifted in their lifetimes. There will be actions in the cloud forests of Costa Rica, and in the highlands of Peru where drought has wrecked the lives of local farmers. In Monterrey, Mexico, they’ll recall last year’s floods that did nearly $2 billion in damage. In Chamonix, France, climbers will put a giant red dot on the melting glaciers of the Alps.
And across North America, as the sun moves westward, activists in Halifax, Canada, will “swim for survival” across its bay to highlight rising sea levels, while high-school students in Nashville, Tennessee, will gather on a football field inundated by 2011’s historic killer floods.
In Portland, Oregon, city dwellers will hold an umbrella-decorating party to commemorate March’s record rains. In Bandelier, New Mexico, firefighters in full uniform will remember last year’s record forest fires and unveil the new solar panels on their fire station. In Miami, Manhattan, and Maui, citizens will line streets that scientists say will eventually be underwater. In the high Sierra, on one of the glaciers steadily melting away, protesters will unveil a giant banner with just two words, a quote from that classic of western children’s literature, The Wizard of Oz. “I’m Melting” it will say, in letters three-stories high.
This is a full-on fight between information and disinformation, between the urge to witness and the urge to cover-up. The fossil-fuel industry has funded endless efforts to confuse people, to leave an impression that nothing much is going on. But — as with the tobacco industry before them — the evidence has simply gotten too strong.
Once you saw enough people die of lung cancer, you made the connection. The situation is the same today. Now, it’s not just the scientists and the insurance industry; it’s your neighbors. Even pleasant weather starts to seem weird. Fifteen thousand U.S. temperature records were broken, mainly in the East and Midwest, in the month of March alone, as a completely unprecedented heat wave moved across the continent. Most people I met enjoyed the rare experience of wearing shorts in winter, but they were still shaking their heads. Something was clearly wrong and they knew it.
The one institution in our society that isn’t likely to be much help in spreading the news is… the news. Studies show our papers and TV channels paying ever less attention to our shifting climate. In fact, in 2011 ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox spent twice as much time discussing Donald Trump as global warming. Don’t expect representatives from Saturday’s Connect the Dots day to show up on Sunday’s talk shows. Over the last three years, those inside-the-Beltway extravaganzas have devoted 98 minutes total to the planet’s biggest challenge. Last year, in fact, all the Sunday talk shows spent exactly nine minutes of Sunday talking time on climate change — and here’s a shock: all of it was given over to Republican politicians in the great denial sweepstakes.
Continued at linkIf we’re going to tell this story — and it’s the most important... more
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"Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives will revive efforts to quickly advance the stalled Keystone XL crude oil pipeline and insist that approval for the project be part of a long-term deal to fund highways and other infrastructure.
Earlier this year, President Barack Obama put a hold on TransCanada's $7 billion project, which would ship oil from Canada and northern U.S. states to Texas, because he said it needed further environmental review.
Republicans have attacked the decision by the Democratic president in the run-up to the November presidential elections, saying the United States needs the jobs and the oil as the economy continues to struggle and gasoline prices surge.""Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives will revive efforts to quickly... more
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By Olivier Knox | The Ticket - Under fire over painfully high gas prices, President Barack Obama embarks Wednesday on a two-day trip to defend his energy policy from a Republican onslaught linking his policies to painfully high gas prices.By Olivier Knox | The Ticket - Under fire over painfully high gas prices, President... more
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As 350.org co-founder Bill McKibben explains in the video, we're gearing up for a major new fight to end the billions of dollars in subsidies the fossil fuel industry receives each year -- the tax-breaks, handouts, and loopholes that are just adding to the record-breaking profits that these companies are already making. And perhaps most importantly, getting rid of fossil fuel subsidies across the board would be a huge step to cutting carbon emissions and putting us back on a pathway to 350 ppm.
The subsidies battle is gaining momentum, and fast. In a recent speech, President Obama called for an end to subsidies to Big Oil and said, “Let's put every single member of Congress on record: You can stand with oil companies or you can stand up for the American people.”
As you probably know, we haven’t agreed with President Obama on everything, but we think getting every member of Congress on the record is a great idea. As a first step, we just launched this short and simple petition that reads: "I call on Congress to end all subsidies to fossil fuel companies, and invest in green jobs and clean energy instead."
Please take a minute to add your name to the petition calling for Congress to put an end to fossil fuel subsidies. Over the next month, we'll ramp up the pressure -- on Twitter, on Facebook, over the phones, and in district -- to get every politician to tell us where he or she stands on these subsidies. For now, we'll use this petition to show Congress how important this issue is -- and when we launch our big push to get every member of Congress on the record, they'll know that we have an army of concerned citizens who have our back.
As Rev. Lennox Yearwood of the Hip-Hop Caucus says in the video, “To make this movement successful, we have to continue to keep the pressure going.” We couldn't agree more. Along with taking on fossil fuel subsidies, we're gearing up for some massive new efforts to build this movement:
- Taking on more iconic fossil fuel fights across the country and around the world.
- “Connecting the Dots” between climate change and extreme weather -- expect more on that front very soon!
- Training and supporting thousands of new climate leaders to strengthen our movement.
- And lots more…
None of this work is possible without your participation and leadership. As Bill says in the video: “This fight is going to be a lifetime fight. I’m so, so, so grateful to all of you who are playing such a huge role in it.”
On we go,
May Boeve for the 350.org TeamAs 350.org co-founder Bill McKibben explains in the video, we're gearing up for a... more
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An amendment by Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) to force immediate approval of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline failed to get the 60 votes it needed, on a 56-42 vote. Democrats Max Baucus (MT), Begich (AK), Conrad (ND), Hagan (NC), Landrieu (LA), Manchin (WV), McCaskill (MO), Pryor (AR), Tester (MT), and Webb (VA) voted with Senate Republicans to strip authority for the pipeline’s approval from the president of the United States. Despite the intensity of climate activism in the region, New England Republicans Ayotte (NH), Brown (MA), Collins (ME), and Snowe (ME) stayed with the Republican bloc in favor of the Keystone XL pipeline. The amendment was attached to the unrelated highway funding bill. Moments earlier, Republicans killed an amendment that would have approved the pipeline if it used American steel and kept the oil for American use.
350.org‘s Bill McKibben responds:
“Today’s vote was a temporary victory and there’s no guarantee that it holds for the long run. But given that this thing was a ‘no brainer’ a year ago, it’s pretty remarkable that people power was able to keep working, even in the oil-soaked Senate. We’re grateful to the Administration for denying the permit and for Senate leadership for holding the line.
“The reason this fight has been so hard is because of the financial power of the fossil fuel industry, so that’s what we’re going after now. We’ve been playing defense for months, now we’ve got to quickly go on offense. Going forward, we’ll be working with the huge majorities of Americans who want to end subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. We’ve learned a lot, not all of it savory, about how the political process works and we’re going to put that to use.”
By Brad Johnson on Mar 8, 2012 at 4:25 pmAn amendment by Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) to force immediate approval of the Keystone XL... more
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An amendment by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) to keep the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline American-made and its oil for American markets was defeated 34-64, on strong Republican opposition. The amendment to the unrelated highway bill was designed to expose the hypocrisy of Keystone XL advocates who have argued that the foreign-owned, foreign-oil pipeline was a patriotic American priority. As Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) admitted before the vote, the passage of this amendment would doom the project — because Keystone XL’s owner, TransCanada, intends to build the pipeline with foreign steel and ship its foreign oil for export to foreign markets. Hoeven’s amendment to obligate approval of the project on TransCanada’s terms follows Wyden’s. Democratic senators who voted against the Wyden amendment included those who have opposed the Keystone XL pipeline on grounds of its climate pollution risk, such as Sens. Sanders and Leahy of Vermont, and Sheldon Whitehouse and Jack Reed of Rhode Island.
By Brad Johnson on Mar 8, 2012 at 4:05 pmAn amendment by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) to keep the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline... more
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This is an incredible presentation by photogtapher Garth Lenz showing shocking photographs of the devastation of tarsands along with the beautiful ecosystems threatened by them. Even he could not hold back his emotion when relaying the effects on indigenous communities and the responsibilty we all have in stopping this atrocity of nature before it is too late.This is an incredible presentation by photogtapher Garth Lenz showing shocking... more
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The House voted on an Energy Bill today that would expand offshore drilling, increase drilling in ANWR, expands hydraulic fracturing “fracking” and approved the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, the final vote was 237-187.
House republicans also voted against an amendment that would have kept the oil in the United States for US consumers, which will eventually flow from Canada to Texas refineries via the Keystone XL pipeline. The Republican vote allows the oil to be sold out onto the world markets at higher prices which will do nothing to lower prices in the United States.
An amendment from Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) would have barred exports of Keystone XL pipeline oil, and refined products such as gasoline and diesel fuel.
The number one US export measured in dollars for 2011 was refined petroleum products, such as jet fuel, diesel, and gasoline. If the refined products were allowed to stay in the United States prices at the pumps could have been lowered.
http://www.examiner.com/democrat-in-las-vegas/house-republicans-keystone-xl-pipeline-oil-not-for-us-consumersThe House voted on an Energy Bill today that would expand offshore drilling, increase... more
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In 24 hours, the 99 percent flooded the U.S. Senate with more than 800,000 messages opposing the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. This afternoon, 781,000 of the signatures to the Stop the Keystone XL Pipeline emergency petition were hand-delivered to the U.S. Capitol in boxes of 20,000 names each by members of 350.org, Green For All, and other climate hawks. “In Kentucky, over 2,000 people gathered at a rally opposing mountaintop removal mining picked up their cell phones and called Sen. McConnell to tell him to stop pushing Keystone XL. In New York City, dozens of people visited Sen. Schumer’s office and got him on the record opposing the pipeline. Petition deliveries also took place in Ohio, Maine, North Carolina, New Mexico, and elsewhere.”In 24 hours, the 99 percent flooded the U.S. Senate with more than 800,000 messages... more
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Governor Mitch Daniels (R-IN) is quickly becoming this year's Scott Walker. He's being courted by Republican party officials as a possible running mate for the eventual GOP presidential nominee. He was tapped this week to deliver the GOP rebuttal to President Obama's State of the Union address. Daniels is also under fire for his support of legislation in his state that attacks public employees and unions. And now, lobbying disclosure reports reveal that Gov. Daniels "joined the oil industry in lobbying Congress on behalf of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline."
http://veracitystew.com/2012/01/27/mitch-daniels-used-taxpayer-dollars-to-lobby-for-keystone-xl/Governor Mitch Daniels (R-IN) is quickly becoming this year's Scott Walker.... more
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The GOP thought it had Obama in a trap — approve the pipeline and anger environmentalists, deny it and anger construction unions
In October 2011, National Journal surveyed energy experts about whether Obama was likely to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry Canadian tar-sands oil through the U.S. to the Gulf of Mexico. Ninety-one percent of the “energy and environment insiders” believed he would.
On Wednesday, Obama proved them wrong.
How could the experts have gotten it so wrong? The answer is twofold: Grassroots environmentalists were stronger, and congressional Republicans dumber, than anyone predicted.
Back in August of 2011, when author and activist Bill McKibben staged the first anti-Keystone rallies around the White House, political observers scoffed. These were, after all, the same environmentalists who had been rendered irrelevant by their cap-and-trade defeat and the stress of economic recession. No way they could stop a fossil fuel infrastructure project with big money behind it.
But McKibben kept at it. The movement he seeded grew, forging strategic partnerships with Nebraska farmers, social-justice groups, and unions. Activists staged more rallies, hounded the president everywhere he went and uncovered serious questions about the relationship between the tar-sands industry and the State Department. As the crowds grew, big-money Democratic donors started weighing in on the issue. In November, under intense pressure, Obama announced that the final determination would be delayed until after the election. It was an unexpected display of muscle from the green grass roots.
Still, most observers assumed that Obama was just buying time (and the support of his environmental base) and would approve the pipeline in the spring. That’s where the dumb Republicans came in.
The GOP thought it had Obama in a trap — approve the pipeline and anger environmentalists, deny it and anger construction unions — and that the president had seemingly slipped out of that trap by delaying the decision. Infuriated, Republicans threatened to attach a rider to December’s payroll tax bill forcing Obama to make a decision within six months.
At that point, the administration made it clear that if Congress rushed it into a decision without adequate environmental review, it would reject the pipeline. Nonetheless, the GOP attached the rider to the bill. So yesterday, true to his word, Obama rejected the pipeline.
In other words, Republicans killed their own pet project. Maybe they thought they could bully Obama into submission, in which case they disastrously miscalculated. Or maybe they cared more about an election-year talking point than the pipeline itself. Either way, rank-and-file Republicans who genuinely wanted to see the pipeline built have every reason to be angry with their congressional leadership, which has again opted for tantrums over tangible policy victories.
The pipeline has not been killed for good, of course. Obama made it clear yesterday that he still believes in oil and gas development. TransCanada, the company behind the project, will reapply for a permit next year, so the battle may repeat itself then.
But for now, the fight is about who controls the message heading into November. On this, the experts are similarly unanimous: The GOP has the administration right where it wants it, stuck with yet another maddening choice of “jobs versus environment,” a dichotomy it’s happy to bring up through November.
But the experts have been wrong before (just a few paragraphs ago, in fact). The Keystone XL victory (along with the stunning reversal of momentum behind the Stop Online Piracy Act) shows that organizing still matters. Organizing brings money and intensity, which are the coin of the realm in politics. If the Keystone coalition is capable of a victory on policy, there’s no reason continued organizing can’t win a victory on messaging.
For the coalition winning that victory will mean going directly after its enemy’s purported strength: jobs. In a press conference denouncing Obama’s decision yesterday, Speaker of the House John Boehner claimed that canceling the pipeline would destroy tens of thousands of jobs. But the only independent study done on the matter, from the Cornell Global Labor Institute, found that the pipeline would create between 500 and 1,400 jobs, almost all temporary construction jobs. The State Department, meanwhile, estimates it would create 5,000 to 6,000 jobs.
By way of contrast, just a few months ago the GOP rallied to vote down the president’s American Jobs Act, which, according to a Moody’s Analytics estimate, would have created 1.9 million jobs. That a short-term pipeline project has become the heart of the GOP jobs program is a kind of reductio ad absurdum of the conservative economic agenda.
The pipeline also wouldn’t have served the (somewhat illusory) goal of “energy independence.” Americans will have no special claim on the oil piped through it. As recent reports have shown, the vast bulk of that oil will be exported to petro-hungry areas like Europe and Latin America. TransCanada officials have admitted in congressional testimony that opening Canada’s oil to export will boost its value and thus increase its price for Americans. More likely, any change in the price of oil or gasoline will be a faint signal lost amid natural fluctuations.
There are, of course, ways to create American jobs and strengthen American energy security. Most of them are under attack by the very same Republicans lamenting the loss of Keystone XL. For instance, the GOP has vowed to block extension of the Production Tax Credit that supports wind power developers. According to a study commissioned by the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), that could lead to the loss of 37,000 jobs — good, permanent jobs. The Department of Energy’s loan guarantee program for renewables has, according to DOE, created 60,000 direct jobs in the wind and solar industries. The GOP is trying to kill it too. (Both AWEA and DOE have reason to trumpet their economic benefits, of course, but their numbers are generally taken seriously by investors.)
Supporters of clean energy can win the messaging battle if they can focus the conversation on what kind of jobs Americans want, which is to say, what kind of country Americans want. Do we want ephemeral jobs building oil infrastructure that overwhelmingly benefits those who happen to be sitting on top of the oil? Or do we want high-skill jobs in manufacturing, engineering, design, and a dozen other trades, in industries that will dominate the 21st century, with profits that stay in U.S. communities? Do we want to continue cooking the planet, or do we want to lead the way toward solutions?
Winning that messaging battle won’t be about cleverness — it will be about volume and repetition. Greens can never match the money behind fossil fuels, but as the Keystone XL fight has shown, they can out-organize and outmaneuver their opponents when they put their bodies and sweat into it. As long as they ignore the “experts,” they’ll be fine.
– David Roberts is a staff writer for Grist. This piece was originally published at Grist.The GOP thought it had Obama in a trap — approve the pipeline and anger... more
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Desperation can lead to poor decisions. So can wishful thinking. Both elements are at work in the case of the Keystone XL pipeline project, rejected by the Obama administration on Wednesday.
[Important article today from the ultra-conservative Pittsburgh Tribune-Review]
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/opinion/s_777467.html
The economics of the proposed pipeline are nonsensical.
It makes no sense for Canadian oil producers, acting essentially in a panic mode, to ignore the economic red flags that should prevent them from turning a blind eye to the reality of competitive economics.
They are committing billions of dollars toward patently unsound projects.
The cost of production from Canada, when tar sands oil are moved to the U.S. Gulf Coast by pipeline, is on the order of $50 per barrel more than conventional foreign oil imports.
Obviously one would never expect Canadian supplies to be competitive in this location.
The major impetus for the Keystone pipeline to the Gulf Coast is the urgent need of the Canadian tar sands producers -- who extract crude oil from sands in remote western Canada -- to create an outlet for their planned production increases.
Billions of dollars of investment have already been spent, and more is committed, to create facilities capable of extracting Canadian bitumen from the vast tar sands reserves.
The current high price of petroleum has provided the economic justification for these projects. Universally, all of the planned production is assumed to be marketable regardless of quality. This is the fatally flawed assumption.
Canadian bitumen contains a component not present in most of the world's current oil production, save for Venezuela. This component is asphaltenes, a material with the same characteristics as coal.
In the case of previous Venezuelan and Canadian production, the producers have provided upgrading capacity, essentially on-site or in dedicated facilities financed by the producer, to facilitate removal of the asphaltene component.
The remaining asphaltene-free oil is what is then moved into the market. The current Canadian production expansions omit this costly step and, instead, assume that somehow, this expensive impediment will magically disappear.
Such is not the case.
Transport costs are another overlooked fact.
All crudes of identical quality will have the same market value at any U.S. location. This simplifies the decision on movement from an inland location as this decision is reduced to the relative transportation cost of one destination versus another.
But in the case of in-land transportation of Canadian crude from Hardisty, in the province of Alberta, the two obvious outlets are Canadian/U.S. West Coast and U.S. Gulf Coast. Both moves would best be accomplished by pipeline.
The distance -- and therefore the cost -- to the Gulf Coast is approximately four times that to the West Coast. When this difference in distance is expressed as pipeline cost in dollars per barrel, the West Coast destination is $8 to $10 a barrel less costly.
Since the crude has the same value delivered to each location, it is obvious that the West Coast outlet will be the one that is ultimately chosen.
A pipeline to the U.S. Gulf coast cannot compete while shouldering this large added expense with no offsetting benefit.
(William Edwards, who runs Edwards Energy Consultants of Katy, Texas, has spent more than 50 years working in oil economics and pricing.)Desperation can lead to poor decisions. So can wishful thinking. Both elements are at... more
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For months conservative media have advocated on behalf of TransCanada Corporation, the Canadian company seeking to build the Keystone XL pipeline through the U.S. to carry tar sands oil from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico. After opposing every major effort under the Obama administration to stimulate the economy, conservative media -- led by Fox News -- have claimed that the pipeline should be approved because it would provide jobs even as it threatens the environment. Their job figures rely on industry-funded studies, and at times even grossly exaggerate those estimates. Watch as they struggle to get on the same page regarding which inflated estimate to use.
January 19, 2012 2:42 pm ET by Jocelyn Fong & Shauna TheelFor months conservative media have advocated on behalf of TransCanada Corporation, the... more
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Much is being said about the Keystone XL pipeline and most of what is being said by the Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), are just flat out lies, and they know it. They are constructing a wedge issue for Republicans to use in campaigns.
Both are saying that the pipeline would create tens of thousands of jobs and both are saying that President Obama has done nothing to increase US oil production, and both are lies.
First the facts for the Keystone XL pipeline.
A report by Cornell University’s Global Labor Institute on the Keystone XL pipeline: (this is a summary of their key finding, read the entire report here)
The industry’s US jobs claims are linked to a $7 billion KXL project budget. However, the budget for KXL that will have a bearing on US jobs figures is dramatically lower—only around $3 to $4 billion. A lower project budget means fewer jobs.
The project will create no more than 2,500-4,650 temporary direct construction jobs for two years, according to TransCanada’s own data supplied to the State Department.
The company’s claim that KXL will create 20,000 direct construction and manufacturing jobs in the U.S is not substantiated.
There is strong evidence to suggest that a large portion of the primary material input for KXL—steel pipe—will not even be produced in the United States. A substantial amount of pipe has already been manufactured in advance of pipeline permit issuance.
The industry’s claim that KXL will create 119,000 total jobs (direct, indirect, and induced) is based on a flawed and poorly documented study commissioned by TransCanada (The Perryman Group study). Perryman wrongly includes over $1billion in spending and over 10,000 person-years of employment for a section of the Keystone project in Kansas and Oklahoma that is not part of KXL and has already been built.
KXL will not be a major source of US jobs, nor will it play any substantial role at all in putting Americans back to work. Even if the Perryman figures were accurate, and all of the workers for the next phase of the project were hired immediately, the US seasonally adjusted unemployment rate would remain at 9.1%—exactly where it is now.
KXL will divert Tar Sands oil now supplying Midwest refineries, so it can be sold at higher prices to the Gulf Coast and export markets. As a result, consumers in the Midwest could be paying 10 to 20 cents more per gallon for gasoline and diesel fuel. These additional costs (estimated to total $2–4 billion) will suppress other spending and will therefore cost jobs.
Pipeline spills incur costs and therefore kill jobs. Clean-up operations and permanent pipeline spill damage will divert public and private funds away from productive economic activity. In 2010 US pipeline spills and explosions killed 22 people, released over 170,000 barrels of petroleum into the environment, and caused $1 billion dollars worth of damage in the United States.
Rising carbon emissions and other pollutants from the heavy crude transported by Keystone XL will also incur increased health care costs. Emissions also increase both the risk and costs of further climate instability.
By helping to lock in US dependence on fossil fuels, Keystone XL will impede progress toward green and sustainable economic renewal and will have a chilling effect on green investments and green jobs creation. The green economy has already generated 2.7 million jobs in the US and could generate many more.
Now, about President Obama killing US oil production and increasing our dependence on foreign oil.
In 2010 and 2011 the United States had produced more oil since 2003. In 2011 for the first time, the United States was a net exporter of petroleum products.
The top export of the United States in 2011 was fuel. The United States is the biggest consumer of fuel and now we are also the biggest exporter of fuel, which is part of the reason why our gas cost so much at the pumps.
From USA Today
“Measured in dollars, the nation is on pace this year to ship more gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel than any other single export, according to U.S. Census data going back to 1990. It will also be the first year in more than 60 that America has been a net exporter of these fuels.”
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) wrote a letter last year to the Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, saying he had “serious concerns” about the pipeline.
“The proponents of this pipeline would be wiser to invest instead in job-creating clean energy projects, like renewable power, energy efficiency or advanced vehicles and fuels that would employ thousands of people in the United States rather than increasing our dependency on unsustainable supplies of dirty and polluting oil that could easily be exported,” Reid wrote.
In 2008 during the campaign for President, one of the biggest rallying cries by John McCain and Sarah Palin was “Drill Baby, Drill”. One of the rally cries for the 2012 election by ALL Americans should be; “What’s drilled in American, Stays in America for Americans”. This is a position that the oil industry pays millions to suppress.
Read the decision by President Obama for postponing the project, Click here.Much is being said about the Keystone XL pipeline and most of what is being said by... more
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America for Sale!
http://wapo.st/zqyNVJ
Environmentalists note that in December 2010, according to Boehner’s financial disclosure forms, he invested $10,000 to $50,000 each in seven firms that had a stake in Canada’s oil sands, the region that produces the oil the pipeline would transport. The firms include six oil companies — BP, Canadian Natural Resources, Chevron, Conoco Phillips, Devon Energy and Exxon — along with Emerson Electric, which has a contract to provide the digital automation for the first phase of a $9.4 billion Horizon Oil Sands Project in Canada.
The American Petroleum Institute, the nation’s largest oil lobby, has launched a television advertising blitz in the Midwest and in the District urging voters to tell the White House they support the plan to transport crude oil from Canada to the Gulf Coast. Environmentalists are planning a Capitol Hill rally later this month to take aim at Republicans and the institute.
See full article here: http://wapo.st/zqyNVJAmerica for Sale!
http://wapo.st/zqyNVJ
Environmentalists note that in December... more
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Instead of having an oil pipeline running down the middle of our country, why not make it a rain water pipeline, catching excess rain water from the north or states that have lots of rain and flood problems, delivering the water to drought states like Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, ect. The water would travel through the pipe and get filtered somewhere down the line. It would help American farmers in drought states to water crops without using the states only water source. It may also help relive floods that occur in Northern States. What do you think?Instead of having an oil pipeline running down the middle of our country, why not make... more
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The zombie pipeline lives!
You might think that the Obama administration's decision last month to delay the construction of the $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline pending further review would have put an end to Big Oil's pipeline dreams. After all, the whole approval process, which dragged on for three years, was a textbook example of corrupt energy politics and shoddy science working in the service of Big Oil. The U.S. State Department, which had final say in the pipeline's approval, wisely and deftly put the pipeline on ice for at least a year.
But you don't kill off Big Oil's pet project that easily.
Last week, Keystone re-emerged as a bargaining chip in end-of-the-year negotiations over extending the payroll tax break for 160 million U.S. workers, which is set to expire Dec. 31. House Majority leader John Boehner has attached a "project rider" to the tax bill, essentially trying to force Obama – and Senate Democrats – to approve the pipeline as a price for passing the tax-relief bill. Boehner and House Republicans are playing up the Keystone policy rider as a jobs project, suggesting that the Obama administration failed to approve last month it because the president is beholden to crazy enviros. A vote on the bill could come as early as today.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/national-affairs/keystone-xl-the-pipeline-that-wont-die-20111213#ixzz1gRlPybICThe zombie pipeline lives!
You might think that the Obama administration's... more
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President Obama's veto threat for a payroll tax cut that includes action on the Keystone oil pipeline is "posturing," the top Senate Republican said Sunday, asserting that enough Democrats support building the pipeline to enable a vote on a GOP-styled compromise.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told "Fox News Sunday" that his Democratic counterpart, Majority Leader Harry Reid, and the president may want to check with their base before threatening to hold up a House version that calls for tying an extension of the tax holiday to a "shovel-ready" project like the transnational pipeline.
"I'm on the same side as Jimmy Hoffa and the AFL- CIO on this. The Teamsters and the AFL-CIO want the Keystone Pipeline right now," said McConnell, R-Ky. "Look, the president has been talking about creating jobs. This is ready to go immediately. All it requires is his sign off.
"Obviously we'll reach an agreement. The president is posturing here," he added.
The House legislation would extend the current payroll tax cut from 6.2 percent to 4.2 percent for another year. It would also extend unemployment benefits for 59 weeks as well as shorten the timeframe for approval of a pipeline from Alberta, Canada, to Texas.
It also eliminates a regulation proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency that would severely limit output on boilers. Twelve Democrats in the Senate have cosponsored legislation to rescind the boiler rules that opponents say could cost 800,000 jobs.
Reid said Friday that sending the House bill over to the Senate would be a waste of time because it will not pass, but McConnell argued otherwise.
"It has bipartisan support. But we also need to have something in there that prevents the loss of jobs and something that will create the jobs," McConnell said. "And that's why we inserted Boiler MACT, supported on a bipartisan basis and the Keystone pipeline supported on a bipartisan basis. One would save jobs, one would create jobs right now."
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who appeared with Durbin on NBC's "Meet the Press," said "taxing one group to pay for a tax cut for another is not going to sell." But he also contradicted McConnell, suggesting that the pipeline proposal "is probably not going to sell" either.
Graham said since both sides acknowledge they want to extend the payroll tax cut, the "more important" decision is how to "come up with sustainable policy that will turn America around."
McConnell suggested that policy begins with a balanced package that "doesn't do anything for millionaires" but also doesn't tax job providers.
"We are not here to defend high income people. And in this bipartisan package that we're just discussing, we make sure that millionaires don't get unemployment and don't get food stamps. We freeze the pay for members of Congress and for all federal workers, continue to freeze the pay that has been frozen. This is a very balanced package," he said
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/12/11/republicans-contend-have-dem-support-to-pass-payroll-tax-cut-pipeline-package/#ixzz1gLK31ltJPresident Obama's veto threat for a payroll tax cut that includes action on the... more
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