Why are Obama and the democrats so opposed to the Keystone Pipeline?

Ah, globalization and its discontents. "If it doesn't benefit me directly...". Ok, so India doesn't get a stable, plentiful supply of oil from Canada. You are right, it doesn't benefit you directly. But what do you care about all the other countless transactions in the global economy that don't benefit you directly? Will you put up resistance against them, too?

 

This entire eminent domain argument from the left is such a farce. None of the left oppose Keystone XL because of property rights issues and eminent domain. They oppose Keystone XL because it helps enable the use of fossil fuels. In many of these people's perfect world, everyone gets their power from solar and wind and everyone rides on white unicorns to the office every day. Fossil fuels, which lift people out of poverty and provide a competitive advantage for the United States' economy, is demonized by the left. They will stop at nothing to eradicate its use, even if that means economic disaster. It's a fantasy land that has no grounding in economic or practical reality.

These are the Hollywood celebrities telling us that a 0.5 degree temperature rise over the next 100 years will wipe mankind off the planet. Nevermind the fact that scientists can't predict tomorrow's weather -- the science is settled and we are all doomed. Nothing will save us except tax increases and solar and wind power.

 

I agree with what Major said here, I would also like to add a couple of things.
TransCanada exaggerate its benefit by a huge amount, 42k jobs, 20 billion economic impact, 5 billion tax ...
~95% of Canada oil is already being shipped to the US by other means, the economic benefits, jobs, tax are already being realized. Shipping it by pipeline may change it a little but you cannot double claim all of the benefits it has.

What more, if Canada decides to put THEIR oil on tankers, who will stop them? Right now, they are complaining that they have to sell crude oil to the US at a discount (because they have no means to sell it to anybody else), I imagine they would love to see if Japan, India or China can pay a little better. In turn, the price we pay here at home will also go up.

 

#2 is hardly irrelevant. If more people want something than don't - especially if its a large majority - then that small vocal minority shouldn't hold the others hostage...nor the project. If it did, then highways would never be built, leaders never elected and so on. The concerns of the minority are important but these concerns have been addressed. TransCanada seeks a 50-foot-wide strip of land on which to build the pipeline. Landowners would continue to own the property; the pipeline would be constructed and operated below ground. The fact that a few landowners don't like that despite being paid for this access is not a very heavy burden for them to bear.

Well, certainly the towns where this would occur seem to be overwhelmingly in support of the pipeline. Many of them are DESPERATE for any sort of economic stimulus. Given all things said, I would trust these folks to know what's in their best interests. This is not the first pipeline to be built. There are successful precedents.

I too do not know the specific net benefit vs. cost. I simply assume that the desire of the local and state politicians to build this means they probably did the cost/benefit analysis. It isn't often that politicians from both sides of the aisle agree on something like this, (in the affected areas of course). If it does, I have to assume the economic/tax benefits are a net win.

I'm confused at what you are getting at here (in relation to my original point which was to speak of benefits of the pipeline.) Can you clarify?

 

How many layoffs will it prevent?

 

So now we can't build anything unless the government deems it critical?

From #youdidntbuildthat to #youcantbuild that.

From the Financial Times, it seems there are quite a few critical benefits to be gained.

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/887f6736-a8c1-11e4-97b7-00144feab7de.html#axzz3QWFJyRLk


Refiners say Keystone is route to oil independence
Barney Jopson in Washington and Ed Crooks in New YorkAuthor alerts

Republicans backing the Keystone XL oil pipeline say it would create thousands of jobs in an economy grappling with slow wage growth, but US refiners supporting the project argue a more fundamental concern is at stake: American energy security.

The refining industry on the US Gulf Coast says the primary benefits of the proposed pipeline from Canada would be to replace risky crude supplies from countries such as Venezuela and cut the chances of catastrophic oil train wrecks.

Republicans who took control of Congress this year want to make a bill to approve Keystone the first legislation they send to President Barack Obama. It passed the Senate last week and now goes to the House of Representatives.

The GOP says the pipeline would create 42,000 jobs, a claim disputed by fact-checkers and Mr Obama, who has vowed to veto the bill and said Keystone would do more to exacerbate climate change than it did to create work.

The president has not issued a final ruling on the pipeline as he awaits a review that has dragged on for six years. But refineries in Texas and Louisiana — which will be the US’s biggest winners if it is built — say he should approve the project because it will make American oil supplies more secure.

Industry officials voiced concern about the US’s current dependence on oil from Venezuela, an antagonist whose economy is in a tailspin, and on shipments of Canadian crude oil by rail, whose safety record has been blotted by catastrophic accidents.

Todd Staples, president of the Texas Oil & Gas Association, told the Financial Times: “The blocking of the pipeline by this administration is a huge missed opportunity . . . A missed opportunity for North American crude replacing crude from places like Venezuela, who do not have our best interests at heart.”

Texas and Louisiana are home to 46 refineries that remain big importers of foreign crude despite the US’s shale energy revolution.
The second biggest source of Gulf Coast imports after Mexico is Venezuela, which shipped 730,000 barrels per day in November 2014, the last month for which data are available.

According to a US state department study, the Keystone pipeline would deliver the same volume — 730,000 bpd — from oil sands projects in Canada to the Gulf Coast, as well as 100,000 bpd from the US shale state of North Dakota.

Those supplies would displace existing imports, dealing another blow to Mexico, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, which export medium-to-heavy crude and are already grappling with the low oil price.

The principal beneficiaries of Keystone XL — apart from the pipeline operator TransCanada and Canada’s oil sands producers — would include the US refiners Valero Energy, ExxonMobil, Royal Dutch Shell and Marathon Petroleum, said analysts at Evercore ISI.

A spokesman for Valero, which owns seven refineries in Texas and Louisiana, said: “Valero continues to support the Keystone XL pipeline and we are hopeful it will be approved soon. It should have been approved years ago.
“The heavy crude shipped on Keystone XL will help offset declining supplies of higher cost heavy crude from Mexico and South America.”

The refineries of Texas and Louisiana have a combined capacity to process 8.4m barrels per day, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

Richard Metcalf, director of environmental affairs at the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil & Gas Association, said Keystone’s construction would reduce refiners’ reliance on rail and river transport, which they have turned to reluctantly while the pipeline is in limbo.


“With the rail car wrecks and a barge sinking in the Mississippi river or just disruptions in the Mississippi river . . . they’re just not as secure methods of getting the crude, whereas pipelines are pretty consistent and reliable,” he said, adding that Keystone would also be cheaper.

Although data are not available on rail shipments from Canada, analysts say a significant volume of oil is transported south by train from the oil sands — and from North Dakota’s shale wells — then transferred on to barges for the final leg to Louisiana’s coastal refineries.

The volumes have been enough to cause trouble for Midwestern farmers as they struggle to secure space to ship grains on railways that are filled to capacity with crude.

“The trains in the Chicago area are all backed up because of all the crude going in whichever direction, so the other commodities are fighting for rail space,” says Mr Metcalf.

Keystone XL would run from Alberta to Steele City, Nebraska, where it would merge with an existing TransCanada pipeline, which helps ensure some Canadian oil already reaches the US by pipeline — 241,000 bpd last November.

 

They're going to lay off every driver that's currently transporting their oil without the pipeline and they're going to lay off probably 99.9% of the construction workers that build the pipeline. So... I guess do the math.

 

You can build whatever you want on your own land. Forcing people to sell their land because a foreign company wants to increase its profits with a pipeline... well, no.

 

Why would we build a damn pipeline instead of using Eminent Domain to build a Euro-Class train system?

An oil pipeline....

r e a l l y

 

How does that displace existing imports?
Those supplies are already being used here in the US.
You need to critically think about what people write.

 

If you're one of those construction workers, you're probably going from project to project. So having this is probably a big deal.

 

They can buy all they want from the Saudis. I'm saying it doesn't have to be dirty, inefficient Canadian oil. Save that inefficient oil for last on the planet when it can be used for more critical uses than burning it.

But you knew that before you posted you standard willfully ignorant post.

 

Environmental impact is just a pretext.

Real motive is anti-capitalism. It's why all the ex commies have found a home in the green movement.

Same reason they all oppose nuclear power.

Obama knows the game quite well. Tie it up in court and in the bureaucracies until it becomes cost prohibitive. Just wear people down and demoralize them until they give up trying.

It's the reason we haven't had any nuclear power plants built in decades.

 

Tell us more of these "real motives"

 

If big oil was building these Euro-Class train systems, then I am sure this wouldn't be an issue. For now, its the tax payers footing that pipe dream.

 

not complicated

Keystone = profits = bad

 

No, really it's

Keystone delivers Canadian profits = No benefit to the US = Bad

 

You mean to tell me you believe that all the reasonable arguments presented in this thread are just a smokescreen and the real reason is we all hate profits.

I just want to make I am understanding you correctly before I mock the hell out of you.

 

Wait, where are all the faux-conservatives who should be up in arms over the gubermint meddling in private citizens' bidness with emmienant domaine? The free market tells us that if the landowners won't fork over the land, well, you need to pay them more (or shoot them)!!

Free market baby!! Let it do its work!!