APPHOTO DCPM106: Secretary of State John Kerry listens as President Barack Obama announces he’s rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline because he does not believe it serves the national interest, Friday November 6, 2015, in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington.
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President Obama is widely expected to veto Keystone XL before he leaves office in early 2017.
President Obama has officially rejected the request by a Canadian oil company to build the 1,179 mile pipeline that would’ve connected crude oil from Canada’s tar sands and United States sources in between with the refineries that populate the American gulf coast.
Democrats and environmental groups latched onto Keystone as emblematic of the type of dirty fossil fuels that must be phased out. According to a State Department review, extracting crude oil from oil sands releases about 17% more greenhouse gases than standard oil extraction.
Canadian manufacturers will lose out on millions more of spin-off activity that this US$8 billion privately-funded project would provide. Although Obama insisted both sides had overhyped the pipeline, his many delays only fueled the mushrooming political controversy.
A protest against the Keystone XL pipeline.
“TransCanada and its shippers remain absolutely committed to building this important energy infrastructure project”, Russ Girling, TransCanada’s president and chief executive officer, said in a statement.
The decision comes after a seven-year review into the project, which has sharply divided petroleum interests and environmentalists.
“America is prepared to show the world the way forward”.
Green America, with 200,000 individual members and 3,000 business members, has been a vocal opponent of the Keystone XL Pipeline project.
We are thankful for the support of American and Canadian workers, labor organizations, industry, our shippers and, most of all, Americans and Canadians.
TransCanada is reviewing the decision and its rationale.
The project would have linked existing pipeline networks in Canada and the United States. They said it was a job creator; it would have created exactly 35 permanent jobs.
The pipeline will not increase USA energy security – the oil is intended for export.
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While Canada’s Liberals back Keystone XL, they have made it clear they will not adopt the same tack as Canada’s outgoing Conservatives, who irritated the US administration with constant pressure over pipeline. The decision was seen as paving the way for Obama to reject Keystone rather than let the issue linger. President Obama is willing to sacrifice economic growth for little-to-no environmental gains.
