Home » Posts tagged 'oil pipeline' (Page 2)
Tag Archives: oil pipeline
Emails: How State Department Secretly Approved Expanding Piece of Enbridge’s “Keystone XL Clone”
Emails: How State Department Secretly Approved Expanding Piece of Enbridge’s “Keystone XL Clone”
DeSmogBlog has obtained dozens of emails that lend an inside view of how the U.S. State Department secretly handed Enbridge a permit to expand the capacity of its U.S.-Canada border-crossing Alberta Clipper pipeline, which carries tar sands diluted bitumen (“dilbit”) from Alberta to midwest markets.
The State Department submitted the emails into the record in the ongoing case filed against the Department by the Sierra Club and other environmental groups in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota. Collectively, the emails show that upper-level State Department officials hastened the review process on behalf of Enbridge for its proposed Alberta Clipper expansion plan, now rebranded Line 67, and did not inform the public about it until it published its final approval decision in the Federal Register in August 2014.
According to a March 17, 2014 memo initially marked “confidential,” Enbridge’s legal counsel at Steptoe & Johnson, David Coburn, began regular communications with the State Department on what the environmental groups have dubbed an “illegal scheme” beginning in at least January 2014.
Image Credit: U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota
Environmental groups have coined the approval process an “illegal scheme” because the State Department allowed Enbridge to usurp the conventionalpresidential permit process for cross-border pipelines, as well as the standard National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process, which allows for public comments and public hearings of the sort seen for TransCanada’s KeystoneXL pipeline.
Further, the scheme is a complex one involving Enbridge’s choice to add pressure pump stations on both sides of the border to two pipelines, Enbridge Line 3 andEnbridge Line 67, to avoid fitting under the legal umbrella of a “cross-border” pipeline.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Obama’s Veto of Keystone XL Bittersweet for Texans Forced to Allow the Pipeline on Their Land
Obama’s Veto of Keystone XL Bittersweet for Texans Forced to Allow the Pipeline on Their Land
As expected, President Obama today vetoed the Republican bill attempting to allow TransCanada to finish constructing the Keystone XL tar sands export pipeline. While the veto received praise from environmentalists, along with encouragement to reject the pipeline entirely, the veto provides little consolation to those in Texas who already have the southern route of the pipeline moving Canadian tar sands under their land.
“Don’t get me wrong. I’m thrilled that President Obama owned up to his promise to veto the Keystone XL pipeline bill today. But in the same breath I’m spittin’ mad,” Julia Trigg Crawford, Texas landowner who fought TransCanada from taking her land by eminent domain but lost, told DeSmogBlog.
“Nearly three years ago, with the exact same data in front of him he decided to ‘cut through the red tape and fast track’ the southern leg of this project. Where was his ‘climate test’ then?” “Before the ink is dry on this veto, President Obama owes all of us in Texas and Oklahoma an explanation. Better yet, an apology.”
In the constant clamor from high profile environmental groups for President Obama to reject the Keystone XL pipeline, there is little mention that the president fast-tracked the southern portion of the pipeline. Nor do most people know that TransCanada is already transporting tar sands from Canada to the Gulf Coast.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
How Nebraskans are winning the fight against Keystone XL
How Nebraskans are winning the fight against Keystone XL
Senate Democrats filibustered a measure yesterday that would speed up the vote on whether to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, which could take the decision on Keystone out of the hands of both the White House and the State Department. Known as cloture, the move — pushed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell — would have effectively quashed 12 amendments to the bill brought by Democrats, including one to close the “Haliburton loophole” and mandate that gas drilling companies comply with the Safe Drinking Water Act, and another to require that oil companies contribute money to government clean-up efforts in the event of spills or leakage. In the wake of the 50,000 gallon crude oil spill into Montana’s Yellowstone River on January 17, the result of a pipeline “breach,” Republicans’ efforts seem especially bold. As congressional Republicans jockey to rush approval of the controversial infrastructure project, the millions who live along the Keystone XL’s proposed route have been left out of the conversation on Capitol Hill.
Art Tanderup is a farmer and retired schoolteacher. He and his wife, Helen, live in Antelope County, Neb., just outside the town of Neligh along the eastern Sandhills and over the Ogallala Aquifer, which supplies water to over 80 percent of High Plains residents — around 2.3 million people. A few years ago, a representative from TransCanada told the Tanderups that the Keystone XL pipeline would run directly through their property, offering — as they had other landowners in the region — money to sign an “easement,” or legal right of way for the company to build on their farm. After researching the pipeline and the tar sands, Art became involved with Bold Nebraska, which has been a leading voice in the fight against the pipeline since its founding in 2010. Since that time, Art has been active in the movement against the Keystone XL pipeline in Nebraska and at the national level, working with the Cowboy Indian Alliance and advocating against the pipeline in Washington, D.C. Last fall, Tanderup Farms hosted Willie Nelson, Neil Young and thousands from around the country for the “Harvest of Hope” concert, a benefit for Bold Nebraska, theIndigenous Environmental Network and the Cowboy Indian Alliance.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Enbridge Gets Another Federal Tar Sands Crude Pipeline Permit As Senate Debates Keystone XL
Enbridge Gets Another Federal Tar Sands Crude Pipeline Permit As Senate Debates Keystone XL
On January 16, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers gave Enbridge a controversialNationwide Permit 12 green-light for its proposed Line 78 pipeline, set to bring heavy tar sands diluted bitumen (“dilbit”)from Pontiac, Illinois to its Griffith, Indiana holding terminal.
The permit for the pipeline with the capacity to carry 800,000 barrels-per-day of tar sands dilbit came ten days after the introduction of S.1 — the Keystone XL Pipeline Act — currently up for debate on the U.S. Senate floor, which calls for the permitting of the northern leg of TransCanada’s Keystone XL.
Image Credit: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Griffith is located just south of Whiting, Indiana, home of a massive refinery owned by BP. In November 2013, BP opened its Whiting Modernization Project, whichretooled to refine up to 85-percent of its capacity as heavy dilbit from the tar sands, up from its initial 20-percent capacity.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Flashpoint Issue 2015: Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline | Environment News Service
Flashpoint Issue 2015: Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline | Environment News Service.
WASHINGTON, DC, December 29, 2014 (ENS) – A renewed battle over the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline is shaping up for the new year in North America.
The Republicans, who favor the Alberta-Gulf Coast pipeline because of the jobs and energy security they say it will create, will have a majority in both houses of Congress for the first time since TransCanada Corp. filed an application for the pipeline six years ago.
They plan to bring up legislation early in January to force President Barack Obama to sign the required Presidential Permit for the pipeline that declares it to be in the national interest. The Permit is needed because Keystone XL would cross an international border.
The proposed 1,179-mile (1,897 km), 36-inch-diameter pipeline would carry diluted bitumen from Hardisty, Alberta, and extend south to Steele City, Nebraska, where it would join existing pipelines to carry the dilbit to refineries on the Gulf of Mexico. The refined product is planned largely for export.
Obama says he is waiting for a lawsuit over the pipeline route in Nebraska to be settled, but has signaled that he views Keystone XL as a threat to international efforts to limit climate change.
Obama May Have To Shut Down Government To Halt The Keystone Pipeline | Zero Hedge
Obama May Have To Shut Down Government To Halt The Keystone Pipeline | Zero Hedge.
It would appear the first big test for President Obama’s ‘veto’ pen will be no lesser issue than the Keystone Pipeline. Reuters reports that Republicans will quickly introduce stand-alone legislation in the first quarter of 2015 that would approve the Keystone XL crude oil pipeline from Canada, Republican Senator John Hoeven said in an interview. “It’s really a good chance to see if the president’s willing to work with us,” Hoeven said, suggesting they would pressure Obama to act one way or another by attaching the bill to some must-pass legislation leaving Obama’s only option but to fold or shut down the government. As Reince Priebus exclaimed, “he’s going to be boxed in.”
- MCCONNELL SAYS KEYSTONE EMPLOYMENT FIGURES ARE ‘STUNNING’
Republicans will quickly introduce stand-alone legislation in the first quarter of 2015 that would approve the Keystone XL crude oil pipeline from Canada, Republican Senator John Hoeven said in an interview.
“I think Keystone will be one of the first bills we’ll be able to put up in the new Congress,” said Hoeven, from the oil-rich state of North Dakota.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Kinder Morgan Canada pipeline plans hits a mountain of opposition | Business | Reuters
Kinder Morgan Canada pipeline plans hits a mountain of opposition | Business | Reuters.
VANCOUVER (Reuters) – A Western Canadian pipeline once seen as the best near-term hope for sending more of the country’s controversial tar sands crude to Asia has hit another snag: aboriginal communities intent on using the courts to block the proposed expansion.
Kinder Morgan Energy Partners’ (KMP.N:Quote) C$5.4 billion ($4.8 billion) Trans Mountain expansion would twin a 60-year-old line running from the oil-rich province of Alberta to the coastal city of Vancouver, tripling its capacity.
The pipeline expansion had been seen as sure bet because it uses an existing route. But a surge in municipal opposition in recent months has fueled industry worries that it will enter legal and regulatory limbo along with the unbuilt TransCanada Corp (TRP.TO: Quote) Keystone XL and Enbridge Inc (ENB.TO: Quote) Northern Gateway pipelines.
The odds against the expansion are growing. Aboriginal communities along the route, angered by a consultation process they call unfair, are strategizing as a group on legal tactics they hope will stop the project dead.
