Keystone Pipeline

[finnbow]

Now that the State Department has released the long-awaited report stating that the Keystone pipeline would not have a meaningful impact upon global CO2 levels, what's Obama going to do? He needs to do something for jobs, but risks alienating the environmental activist wing of his party. What should he do and what will he do?

My view is that the report is correct in that Canada isn't going to stop extracting oil from the tar sands and will somehow get it to market, whether or not we build the Keystone pipeline. We can either benefit economically from building the pipeline or let someone else do so.

[icenine]

As we have seen recently the alternative-transporting on the oil on trains-is not without risk either.

[icenine]

I was listening to Chuck Todd on the satellite radio on the way in to work...seems Obama and the GOP favor new trade agreements (fast tracking agreements) and many Dems like Reid do not...what irony.

[finnbow]

I was listening to Chuck Todd on the satellite radio on the way in to work...seems Obama and the GOP favor new trade agreements (fast tracking agreements) and many Dems like Reid do not...what irony.

I don't really see it as irony. I think it has more to do with the fact that most economists and realists see it as advantageous to our economy, while frightful to organized labor. At this point, Obama is no longer running for office, so he's inclined to do the right thing as opposed to kowtowing to labor.

[CarlV]

The Alaska pipeline is past it's service time and there is no talk of replacing any of it. Just use drones to catch hopefully the start of a major eco-disaster is all I have heard.
I can't get behind it for this reason alone. A train car run off the tracks and may not even leak a drop and regardless can only leak so much. Our best long term option IMO.


Carl

[piece-itpete]

Our population and energy demand is going to do nothing but grow. The more modern our infrastructure is the more competitive we'll be. Build it.

Pete

[CarlV]

Our population and energy demand is going to do nothing but grow. The more modern our infrastructure is the more competitive we'll be. Build it.

Pete

Meh, spend the money rebuilding the Alaskan pipeline. It is much more important the the USA than building a pipeline to Texas refineries that refine that crap oil for EXPORT.


Carl

[finnbow]

The Alaska pipeline is past it's service time and there is no talk of replacing any of it. Just use drones to catch hopefully the start of a major eco-disaster is all I have heard.
I can't get behind it for this reason alone. A train car run off the tracks and may not even leak a drop and regardless can only leak so much. Our best long term option IMO.

Carl

Pipelines are monitored for leakage and any leak can be sectioned off via valves. Of all methods of oil transport from ships to rail to trucks to pipelines, pipelines are probably the safest. For example, far more oil was spilled by the Exxon Valdez in one incident (up to 750,000 barrels) than in the biggest Alaska pipeline leak (16,000 barrels). And then there's the Deepwater Horizon (~5 million barrels). Also, trains use existing tracks, many of which run through cities where accidents are more harmful than in rural areas (refer to the recent Quebec derailment carrying crude oil that killed 50 people). Unfortunately, there is no perfectly safe manner to transport large quantities of oil.

The environmentalists' major complaint about the Keystone pipeline is the production process to convert the tar sands to crude oil, not pipeline leakage. This won't change if the Canadians build a pipeline to Vancouver or ship it by rail elsewhere. As long as the Canadians continue to exploit this resource, the method of its transport isn't the issue. That said, the pipeline is probably the safest and cheapest method and would provide necessary jobs in the US for its construction, operations, and maintenance.

[icenine]

I would say at this point even a few thousand well paying jobs that are long term would help our economy. Hopefully the technology in autos will continue to improve where we can reduce our reliance on oil. Finnbow's right the Canadians are not going to stop.

[CarlV]

I was just talking my own personal view of things, I realize it isn't popular with hardly anybody.


Carl

[merrylander]

The irony is that Petro Canada has only a small stake in the tar sands, the majority of companies operating there are American. Regardless if the keystone is not completed it will run to the pacific coast under a different name and the oil will go to China.

My understanding is that the extraction process has undergone improvements that make it about par with fracking - both leave a lot of polluted water to deal with.

[Oerets]

I for one think it will happen. But know once built the jobs will be few and far between. Also feel the oil will go to the highest bidder. Only the foolish believe the USA will benefit anymore then lets say China.

Plus gave up a long time ago the human race would get off the oil teat and quit killing the planet. The oil companies know this and that is why plans are in place to reap profits from the coming catastrophe. Like buying up water rights...



Barney

[finnbow]

I for one think it will happen. But know once built the jobs will be few and far between. Also feel the oil will go to the highest bidder. Only the foolish believe the USA will benefit anymore then lets say China.

Plus gave up a long time ago the human race would get off the oil teat and quit killing the planet. The oil companies know this and that is why plans are in place to reap profits from the coming catastrophe. Like buying up water rights...

Barney

While I understand your sentiments (particularly in the 2nd paragraph), oil is a fungible resource. It really doesn't matter who gets the oil coming from these tar sands, just that it enters the world market. Also, American refinery jobs (as well as pipeline maintenance and operation) will be long-lasting, unlike the pipeline workers.

[MrPots]

I for one think it will happen. But know once built the jobs will be few and far between. Also feel the oil will go to the highest bidder. Only the foolish believe the USA will benefit anymore then lets say

Barney

I believe it was stated on the evening new that the pipeline will realize a total of 30 permanent jobs once all is said and done.

Wonder how may people lost their property over this thing.

[finnbow]

Interestingly, the study states that transporting the oil by rail vs. pipeline would increase greenhouse emissions by 28 -42%.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/02/03/ten-key-numbers-in-the-keystone-xl-pipeline-report/

[4-2-7]

Meh, spend the money rebuilding the Alaskan pipeline. It is much more important the the USA than building a pipeline to Texas refineries that refine that crap oil for EXPORT.


Carl
That crap oil ?
You do not benefit every single day from petroleum ?

[4-2-7]

Interestingly, the study states that transporting the oil by rail vs. pipeline would increase greenhouse emissions by 28 -42%.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/02/03/ten-key-numbers-in-the-keystone-xl-pipeline-report/
Totally agree plus the risk factor by rail.

[4-2-7]

i believe it was stated on the evening new that the pipeline will realize a total of 30 permanent jobs once all is said and done.

Wonder how may people lost their property over this thing.
msnbc?

[CarlV]

That crap oil ?
You do not benefit every single day from petroleum ?

Tar sand oil is crap oil. Other than using things made of plastic, no.



Carl

[BlueStreak]

I've always believed it should be built, but only once all environmental issues, etc., have been thoroughly worked out. Beyond that, I don't see that job creation will be the largest direct asset. Once a pipeline is built, it requires very few people to maintain/operate it. Unless new refineries are built, and I doubt that will happen, long term job creation will be minimal. In the grand scheme of things, negligible, even.

I say build it, but I believe the "jobs" argument is more political than anything else, in the long run.

Dave

[CarlV]

I re-found this article that I had found previously.

In pushing for the Obama Administration’s approval of TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, the North American oil industry and its political patrons argue that the pipeline is necessary for American energy security and its construction will help wean America of dependence on Mideast oil. But a closer look at the new realities of the global oil market and at the companies who will profit from the pipeline reveals a completely different story: Keystone XL will not lessen U.S. dependence on foreign oil, but rather transport Canadian oil to American refineries for export to overseas markets.

A new report from Oil Change International lays out the case, based on data and documents from the U.S. Energy Information Administration and the Canadian National Energy Board, corporate disclosures to regulators and investors, and analysis of the rapidly shifting oil market.

The facts:

Keystone XL is an export pipeline. The Port Arthur, Texas, refiners at the end of its route are focused on expanding exports to Europe, and Latin America. Much of the fuel refined from the pipeline’s heavy crude oil will never reach U.S. drivers’ tanks.

Valero, the key customer for crude oil from Keystone XL, has explicitly detailed an export strategy to its investors. Because Valero’s Port Arthur refinery is in a Foreign Trade Zone, the company can carry out its strategy tax-free.

In a shrinking U.S. market, Keystone XL is not needed. Since the project was announced, the oil industry acknowledges that higher fuel economy standards and slow economic growth mean declining U.S. oil demand, even as domestic production is booming. Oil from Keystone XL will therefore displace American crude from new, “unconventional” domestic fields in Texas or North Dakota.

“To issue a presidential permit for the Keystone XL, the Administration must find that the pipeline serves the national interest,” said Stephen Kretzmann, executive director of Oil Change International. “An honest assessment shows that rather than serving U.S. interests, Keystone XL serves only the interests of tar sands producers and shippers, and a few Gulf Coast refiners aiming to export the oil.”

Valero has contracted to take at least 100,000 barrels of tar sands crude a day from Keystone XL until 2030. It’s publicly disclosed business model relies on refining heavy sour crude for export. It is upgrading its Port Arthur refinery to process heavy sour into diesel fuel. Its investor presentations clearly show it plans to ship diesel to Latin America and Europe.

Valero – the Texas independent behind last year’s attempt to overturn California’s clean fuel standards – is the only U.S. company among the six customers who have jointly committed to purchase 76 percent of Keystone XL’s initial capacity. The other refiners are Shell, which is part of Motiva, a joint venture between Royal Dutch Shell and the Saudi government, and Total of France, both of which have newly upgraded facilities in Port Arthur tax-free trade zones. There are also two Canadian producers and one international oil-trading firm in the group of six customers.

Link (http://priceofoil.org/2011/08/31/report-exporting-energy-security-keystone-xl-exposed/)


Carl

[MrPots]

I've always believed it should be built, but only once all environmental issues, etc., have been thoroughly worked out. Beyond that, I don't see that job creation will be the largest direct asset. Once a pipeline is built, it requires very few people to maintain/operate it. Unless new refineries are built, and I doubt that will happen, long term job creation will be minimal. In the grand scheme of things, negligible, even.

I say build it, but I believe the "jobs" argument is more political than anything else, in the long run.

Dave

I have a real problem with private industry confiscating men's private land to build this pipeline. A pipeline that will not benefit America and will line the pockets tax free of the international business. \

But then it's not as if anyone really owns the property they buy anyway.... the government owns it all.

[Zeke]

I have no issues -- it's law on the books -- with imminent domain style seizure of property in the event of national interest but I want the displaced folks to be compensated to the point of near ridiculousness.

If it's that important, mere $$$ shouldn't be an issue.

[BlueStreak]

I have a real problem with private industry confiscating men's private land to build this pipeline. A pipeline that will not benefit America and will line the pockets tax free of the international business. \

But then it's not as if anyone really owns the property they buy anyway.... the government owns it all.

I have no issues -- it's law on the books -- with imminent domain style seizure of property in the event of national interest but I want the displaced folks to be compensated to the point of near ridiculousness.

If it's that important, mere $$$ shouldn't be an issue.

Hmmm.........

I can see both points.

Dave

[4-2-7]

Tar sand oil is crap oil. Other than using things made of plastic, no.



Carl

We need lots of crap oil as ingredients for thousands of products we use daily.

It's thoroughly amazing how many things have petroleum in them. Our world population would be cut by 3/4 without it's exploitation.

Not as thats a bad thing. Oil allowed this planet to overpopulate to the extent all resources are overextended.

[finnbow]

Tar sand oil is crap oil. Other than using things made of plastic, no.

Carl

That's not true. It too can be refined into gasoline, heating oil, etc., though the process is certainly more complex and expensive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_sands#Transportation_and_refining

[epifanatic]

I've been against it from the beginning.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogallala_Aquifer

[finnbow]

I've been against it from the beginning.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogallala_Aquifer

It's been rerouted to avoid the Sand Hills and the portions of the aquifer closest the ground's surface.

http://www.businessinsider.com/transcanada-says-it-will-reroute-planned-pipeline-2011-11

[epifanatic]

It's been rerouted to avoid the Sand Hills and the portions of the aquifer closest the ground's surface.

http://www.businessinsider.com/transcanada-says-it-will-reroute-planned-pipeline-2011-11

Yeah, IIRC the original route would've nearly bisected it. It's still too close for me.

[CarlV]

We need lots of crap oil as ingredients for thousands of products we use daily.

It's thoroughly amazing how many things have petroleum in them. Our world population would be cut by 3/4 without it's exploitation.

Not as thats a bad thing. Oil allowed this planet to overpopulate to the extent all resources are overextended.

Yeah, sure. Your source for this information?


Carl

[CarlV]

That's not true. It too can be refined into gasoline, heating oil, etc., though the process is certainly more complex and expensive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_sands#Transportation_and_refining

I followed the cases of cities vs Chevron and how they spun misinformation. Upon learning the truth the judges denied the permits to modify both refineries.

Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our conventional oil, gas and coal supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable. Twenty to 50 percent of the planet’s species would be driven to extinction. Civilization would be at risk.

That is the long-term outlook. But near-term, things will be bad enough. Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding. Economic losses would be incalculable. More and more of the Midwest would be a dust bowl. California’s Central Valley could no longer be irrigated. Food prices would rise to unprecedented levels.

If this sounds apocalyptic, it is. This is why we need to reduce emissions dramatically. President Obama has the power not only to deny tar sands oil additional access to Gulf Coast refining, which Canada desires in part for export markets, but also to encourage economic incentives to leave tar sands and other dirty fuels in the ground.

The global warming signal is now louder than the noise of random weather, as I predicted would happen by now in the journal Science in 1981. Extremely hot summers have increased noticeably. We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced climate change.

We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280 parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/opinion/game-over-for-the-climate.html?_r=1&


Carl

[CarlV]

Here is an 18 page Sierra Club article. I c+p page 16
http://www.sierraclub.org/dirtyfuels/tar-sands/faces/TarSands.pdf

Ed Cable lives three miles from the footprint slated for
Hyperion’s tar sands oil refinery. When he and his neighbors
first heard about the development, all they were told was that it
was for an “undisclosed purpose.” That got him worried.
“If they won’t tell you what it is, it’s probably something you
won’t like,” Cable says.
Once Cable learned that the development would be a refinery
designed to process the dirtiest oil in the world, he sprang into
action, holding community meetings and organizing a community
group, “Save Union County,” to fight the project.
He’s lived in the area since 1969, and the last thing he wants to
see is the rolling hills of his farming community transformed into
an industrial sacrifice zone.
“Hyperion’s tar sands will destroy some of the best farmland in
South Dakota,” Cable says. “It will destroy hundreds of years of
quality air and water.”
Cable looked into emissions from similar refineries in Texas, and
he believes the toxic emissions estimated by Hyperion in their
permit application are understated by nearly a factor of ten.
According to their permit application, Hyperion plans to spew
a combined 3,000 tons of nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide
“responsible for smog and ground-level ozone”, nearly 300 tons of
ammonia, over 800 tons of sulfur dioxide (which causes acid rain),
nearly 500 tons of highly carcinogenic volatile organic compounds,
over 3,000 tons of asthma-inducing particulate matter, and more
than 19 million tons of carbon dioxide.
26
The emissions from this single source will all but guarantee South
Dakota’s failure to meet the EPA’s National Ambient Air Quality
standards. The microscopic soot particles that will be released by
the ton from Hyperion are the most dangerous form of particulate
matter, capable of penetrating deep into the lungs, causing
respiratory disease and increasing risks of heart attacks.
Hyperion also intends to withdraw ten million gallons of water a
day from the Missouri River, but the company hasn’t yet released
a plan for what they will do with the wastewater once it has been
used to process the toxic tar sands oil.
Save Union County’s fight against the tar sands giant recently
made enormous progress. Based on a legal challenge that Cable
and his neighbors filed against Hyperion, the South Dakota
Department of Environment and Natural Resources declared
Hyperion’s permit application incomplete and denied Hyperion’s
initial application to pollute Union County’s air.


Carl

[bobabode]

I've been against it from the beginning.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogallala_Aquifer

I'm with you. This crap oil source is beyond a bad idea. Sour crude indeed. :mad:

[bobabode]

Thanks Carl. It isn't worth the carbon that it will put into the air.

[merrylander]

So then can I assume that all you folks who are against the pipeline are going to join me in a lawsuit against all those coal fired power plants in Ohio that make our well water fo fucking acid that we had to install a $1300 acid neutralizer?

Or are equally against the fracking for gas that pollutes the groundwater?

It is all the same people behaind it all.

[Oerets]

So then can I assume that all you folks who are against the pipeline are going to join me in a lawsuit against all those coal fired power plants in Ohio that make our well water fo fucking acid that we had to install a $1300 acid neutralizer?

Or are equally against the fracking for gas that pollutes the groundwater?

It is all the same people behaind it all.


Yes! But being West of you I will have a hard time showing damages. Truth be told with the prevailing winds our power plants send you acid rain.

From what I been readin the citizens of WVa are getting pretty upset at the coal industry over that spill. There is talk of ...the ...need ...for "Regulation"!


Face it our life style is dirty and unsustainable.


Barney