Friends of the Earth sues State Dept. over Keystone XL

Here's the text of Friends of the Earth's Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the U.S. State Department following its footdragging in supplying the names of "well-connected lobbyists in decision-making" over the Keystone XL pipeline.

October 2011 chart via Friends of the Earth

State Dept. redacted author bios of Keystone XL pipeline environmental report to hide ties to Koch Industries, Shell, BP, ExonMobil, and ConocoPhillips

October 2011 chart via Friends of the Earth

A 2009 State Department cable exposed by Wikileaks revealed coaching by the U.S. State Department to help "oil sands messaging," including "increasing visibility and accessibility of more positive news stories."
     By October of 2011, the stench of collusion with pipeline promoters had become heavy enough to warrant a letter from 13 senators and congressman to the State Department's Inspector General. 
     Now we see, courtesy of Bold Nebraska, that Andy Kroll of Mother Jones has reported more State Department subterfuge:

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     On the day the State Department published the Keystone impact report, the agency also released a cache of documents that ERM submitted in 2012 to win the contract to produce the Keystone environmental report. That cache included a 55-page filing in which ERM stated it had no conflicts of interests writing the Keystone report.
     But there was something strange about ERM's conflict-of-interest filing: The bios for the ERM's experts were redacted.
     Here's what those redactions kept secret: ERM's second-in-command on the Keystone report, Andrew Bielakowski, had worked on three previous pipeline projects for TransCanada over seven years as an outside consultant. He also consulted on projects for ExxonMobil, BP, and ConocoPhillips, three of the Big Five oil companies that could benefit from the Keystone XL project and increased extraction of heavy crude oil taken from the Canadian tar sands.
      Another ERM employee who contributed to State's Keystone report—and whose prior work history was also redacted—previously worked for Shell Oil; a third worked as a consultant for Koch Gateway Pipeline Company, a subsidiary of Koch Industries.

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    You can see what the State Department hid here.

More Keystone XL pipeline bias by State Department revealed by emails obtained by Friends of the Earth

State Department caught adding foreign oil company-
written 'appendix' to environmental impact statement
without identifying the authors. Good job, Hillary!

Here's Wednesday's FOE press release, in its entirety.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Documents made public this morning by Friends of the Earth provide definitive evidence that the State Department's review of a controversial proposed oil pipeline has been irreparably tainted by department employees’ pro-pipeline bias and complicit relationships with industry executives, including an oil lobbyist who was once a top Hillary Clinton campaign aide.

     The internal State Department documents, which pertain to the review of TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline, show that a State Department official cheered “Go Paul!” after TransCanada lobbyist Paul Elliott announced his firm had obtained new support for the pipeline. They reveal multiple department officials’ understanding that TransCanada planned to reapply to pipe oil at potentially dangerous pressures after the Keystone XL was approved (TransCanada announced in August 2010 that it was withdrawing its application for a permit to use high pressures). And they provide further evidence of inappropriately cozy relationships between multiple department employees and lobbyist Elliott, who was lobbying illegally  for as long as two years due to his failure to disclose his lobbying as required by the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

     An overview of key contents of the newly released documents, as well as links to pdfs of the documents themselves, can be found at  http://www.foe.org/new-foia-docs-reveal-smoking-gun-regarding-state-department-bias.

     “The contents of these newly released documents are shocking. They expose a rigged State Department process conducted in close coordination with oil firm TransCanada,” said Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth. “These revelations should disqualify the State Department from playing any further role in the pipeline review. If President Obama is true to his campaign pledge to end the days of lobbyists setting the agenda in Washington, he must revoke the State Department’s authority to approve this pipeline.”

     “If President Obama removes the State Department from the process, a fair-minded reading of the evidence will force him to reject this dirty and dangerous pipeline, and that is exactly what he should do,” Pica said.

The documents made public today were obtained by Friends of the Earth, the Center for International Environmental Law and Corporate Ethics International via the Freedom of Information Act. The State Department initially refused to release the documents, so the groups, represented by Earthjustice, filed suit in May to force their release. The batch of documents made public today is the second round of documents released by the State Department. More documents are expected to be forthcoming.

     On Thursday, September 22, the Washington Post reported on the first round of documents. Those documents indicate that State Department officials provided inside information and coaching to TransCanada.

     The additional evidence of State Department bias and an irreparably flawed process is substantial. For example:

Last fall Secretary of State Clinton said she was “inclined” to approve the pipeline even though an analysis of the pipeline’s potential environmental impacts was not finished.

A Wikileaked document reported on by theLos Angeles Times indicates that State Department officials “alleviated” Canadian officials' concerns about whether the pipeline might be approved and provided them with “messaging” advice.

The firm hired by the State Department to prepare the environmental impact statement and hold public hearings — Cardno Entrix— recently listed TransCanada as one of its “major clients.”

The environmental impact statement released by the State Department in August included an appendix written by two TransCanada employees and a TransCanada consultant(pdf) but did not identify TransCanada as the author. The appendix was a response to an independent report by University of Nebraska professor John Stansbury, Ph.D., about what the worst Keystone XL spills could look like. Though the TransCanada-authored response was included in the environmental impact statement, Stansbury's report itself was not.