Obama on Keystone XL pipeline: 'just gutting our environmental protection — that's not a jobs plan'

Consumer Watchdog: Keystone XL pipeline could raise gas prices up to 40¢ per gallon in Midwest

Thanks, Rep. Lee Terry! Omaha: (402) 397-9944; D.C.: (202) 225-4155

A New Yorker takes up the fight against Keystone XL

Most New Yorkers don't understand, much less care about the importance of the Ogallala aquifer, TransCanada's duplicity, or the difference and increased risk of tar sands "dilbit" versus conventional crude pipelines. This Nebraska girl does.

Empty promises about Keystone XL being safest pipeline ever built; TransCanada won't use any of several new leak-detection technologies

TransCanada has said repeatedly that its Keystone XL will be the safest pipeline ever built, despite the fact that its recently-completed Keystone 1 pipeline is the leakiest new pipeline ever.
     Now comes word, via Bloomberg News' Rebecca Penty and Mike Lee, and published in the Lincoln Journal-Star, that despite its unverifiable boast, TransCanada won't be using the latest and best technological advances to detect spills along the Keystone XL's 2,000-mile path to Texas from Alberta.
     Despite availability of new leak detection technology, including infrared equipment on helicopters or acoustic sensors that can identify the sound of oil seeping from a pinhole-sized opening, TransCanada will instead look for leaks using centralized software and traditional flyovers and surveys that cannot pinpoint the smallest leaks.

     Pipelines spilled an average 112,569 barrels a year in the United States from 2007 to 2012, a 3.5 percent increase from the previous five-year period, according to U.S. Transportation Department figures compiled by Bloomberg.
     The department is studying leak detection as it considers new rules to improve safety. Equipment available to spot spills more quickly would have cut 75 percent off the estimated $1.7 billion in property damage caused by major incidents on oil lines from 2001 to 2011, consultants said in a December report prepared for the department.
     The figure doesn't include cleanup costs in environmentally sensitive areas, fines, lost life and the potentially much bigger financial impact to operators related to investor concerns.

Tar Sands oil leak, Plymouth, Arkansas, 2012

     ...Keystone XL would have to be spilling more than 12,000 barrels a day -- 1.5 percent of its 830,000 barrel capacity -- before its currently planned internal spill-detection systems would trigger an alarm, according to the U.S. State Department, which is reviewing the proposal.
     ...It would cost TransCanada an additional $705,000 to add a fiber-optic cable to the parts of Keystone XL that may affect ecologically sensitive areas, drinking water or populated regions, according to figures compiled by Bloomberg. The line has 141 miles in high-consequence areas, according to the State Department, and the cable costs about $5,000 a mile, December's Transportation Department report estimated.
     Among sensitive new technologies to test for leaks is a 200-pound device the size of a garbage can that's mounted on the outside of a helicopter. The sensor, made by Synodon Inc. in Edmonton, Canada, detects oil vapors in the infrared rays of sunlight to find leaks flowing at rates below 10 barrels a day, according to the company.
     Pipeline operators also are considering using aluminum balls that flow along the conduit with oil or gas, listening for leaks. Pure Technologies Ltd., which makes the balls, says its acoustic systems can spot leaks as small as 0.03 gallons a minute.
     In its original comments on a State Department assessment of Keystone XL, the EPA recommended TransCanada install some of the latest leak detection technology. But in a later report, the State Department questioned the reliability of the gear for use on the entire length of the line, noting its high cost and variable effectiveness.
     ...Internal systems, such as the one planned for Keystone XL, have a spotty record for catching leaks, according to the Transportation Department's report, prepared by the engineering firm Kiefner & Associates Inc. of Worthington, Ohio. Members of the public reported 23 percent of the 197 oil and liquids pipeline leaks between January 2010 and July 2012, according to the study, compared to 17 percent identified by the pipeline companies.

Someone alert Rep. Lee Terry! TransCanada is being bullied by "Aggressive/Abusive" landowners!

This would be funny if TransCanada weren't so relentlessly creepy, amoral and dishonest.
     We attribute the same level of credibility to TransCanada's accusations against landowners that we do to its accusations against Bold Nebraska, which apparently was nowhere near the company's Omaha Office when the corporation reported "opposition attendance" (Oh, please...) to the cops.
   Wait! Maybe it was a transcription mistake! Maybe when TransCanada accused farmers and ranchers of intimidating its employees by saying "There are places out there where he could put them where they would never be found." — maybe that was TransCanada executives talking about leaking pipes made of substandard steel made in India!

Keystone XL comment window to State Department now closed, but it won't be the last opportunity

From the State Department's website:

     On April 22, the comment period on the Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement closed.
     After the comment period, the Department will make appropriate revisions and publish a Final SEIS. Next, the Department will seek the views of other agencies and then make a determination as to whether issuance of a Presidential Permit for the Keystone XL pipeline would serve the national interest. The national interest determination by the Department involves consideration of many factors, including energy security; environmental, cultural, and economic impacts; foreign policy; and compliance with relevant federal regulations.
     The Department intends to provide an additional opportunity for the public to comment during the National Interest Determination (NID) period that will begin with the release the Final SEIS. This additional public comment period will provide a further opportunity for the public to provide input on this proposed project. The Department will provide the details on the NID comment period at a later date.

Environmental Protection Agency rips another State Department whitewash of Keystone XL risks

You can read the letter from the EPA here but below are excerpts from Elizabeth Shope's blog:

Today, the Environmental Protection Agency released its comments on the deficient environmental review for the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline that the State Department published on March 1, 2013. EPA rates the environmental impact statement with a 2 – meaning “insufficient” – and rates the environmental impact of Keystone XL as “EO” for “environmental objections.” EPA expresses serious concerns about the State Department’s markets analysis – which State uses to claim that there would be no significant effect on greenhouse gas emissions.
     EPA also writes that the differences in tar sands diluted bitumen spills and conventional oil spills should be more fully addressed, and that they are “concerned… that the DSEIS does not provide a detailed analysis of the Keystone Corridor Alternative routes.” These findings by EPA help confirm what we have been saying all along: the environmental review by the State Department is inadequate...
      ...Specifically, EPA ...notes that State’s markets analysis is “not based on an updated energy-economic modeling effort” and writes that State should “provide a more careful review of the market analysis and rail transport options...
     Regarding pipeline safety, EPA writes that following the rupture of Enbridge’s pipeline in Marshall, Michigan:

[O]il sands crude sank to the bottom of the Kalamazoo River, mixing with the river bottom's sediment and organic matter, making the oil difficult to find and recover. After almost three years of recovery efforts, EPA recently determined that dredging of bottom sediments will be required to protect public health and welfare and the environment. This determination was based in large part on demonstrations that the oil sands crude associated with the Enbridge spill will not appreciably biodegrade. We recommend that the Final EIS more clearly acknowledge that in the event of a spill to water, it is possible that large portions of dilbit will sink and that submerged oil significantly changes spill response and impacts.

EPA’s comments also request that the State Department address the additional risks that tar sands releases pose to public health – such as high levels of benzene in the air that could require evacuation as was required following the Kalamazoo spill.

Rachel Maddow on the tar sands pipeline rupture in Mayflower, AR

Hedge fund billionaire goes after TransCanada political stooge in MA; Where's our Lee Terry ad, Tom Steyer?

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Just substitute "Lee Terry" in your head every time you see "Steve Lynch" and you'll be fine.

GOP Arkansas oil co. tool, Rep. Jason Rapert, sponsor of HB 1042 to exempt pipeline companies from eminent domain limitations, spins the toxic spill in his district

Via @janekleeb via David

Mayflower, AR pipeline spill; 40 homes now evacuated: attempts to prevent oil pollution of fresh water

Nebraska's second district GOP congressional representative Lee Terry gave false assurances about pipeline safety on Friday, when he called construction of the Keystone XL pipeline a "nobrainer" — on the very day ExxonMobil's underground tarsands pipeline ruptured.

Here's Lee Terry, looking like he got a snootful of John Boehner's stash, calling Keystone XL a 'nobrainer' on VERY day that ExxonMobil tar sands pipeline ruptured in Arkansas, spilling12K+ barrels, causing evacuation

This is a backyard picture of the Mayflower, AR oil spill on March 30, 2013,
from that nasty Exxon pipeline. The local authorities have denied the press
access to these areas so few have actually seen the extent of the spill. This
picture was taken by a friend’s daughter who lives next door to this house.
Share this widely.

Here's the complete irony of Rep. Lee Terry, bad John Wayne impersonator and total oil company sock puppet, giving phony safety assurances in the same week that 15,000 gallons of tar sands oil spilled in Minnesota and on the SAME DAY that an underground tar sands pipeline ruptured in Mayflower, Arkansas, as reported by Rebecca Leber of ThinkProgress:

     One week after the Senate held a symbolic vote in favor of the Keystone XL pipeline, the U.S. saw two different oil spills involving Canadian tar sands crude oil.
     An ExxonMobil pipeline ruptured Friday, leaking approximately 10,000 barrels of tar sands crude in an Arkansas town. As a result, 22 homes have been evacuated as officials clean up the world’s dirtiest oil.
     The Keystone XL pipeline would carry almost nine times the barrels of oil as the Pegasus pipeline.
     The first oil spill came Wednesday, when a train reportedly carrying tar sands oil spilled 15,000 gallons in Minnesota. Also this week, Exxon was hit by a $1.7 million fine for a pipeline that dumped 42,000 gallons of oil in the Yellowstone River in 2011 (the fine itself is a small hinderance for a company that earned $45 billion profit last year).
     As one of the companies to profit from Canadian tar sands, Exxon often takes to its blog to defend its so-called safety. Big Oil lawmakers then repeat those myths despite evidence to the contrary.
     On Friday, the same day as Exxon’s oil spill, Rep. Lee Terry (R-NE) claimed the pipeline is a “no-brainer” and passes environmental “muster.” The State Department recently issued a draft report claiming the pipeline will have no environmental impact, authored by a contractor with extensive ties to oil companies.

Another Texas landowner battles TransCanada

Via Jane Kleeb at Bold Nebraska.

Chris Hayes and Alex Wagner on Keystone XL and infrastructure budget in Congress

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:

---

     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.

---

    You can see what the State Department hid here.

Obscure NE Keystone XL eminent domain lawsuit could stop or stall pipeline; state has already lost twice

Three Cornhusker landowners represents a serious threat to TransCanada's efforts to steamroll farmers and ranchers. Here's the press release, via Bold Nebraska:

---

The lawsuit against the State of Nebraska, filed by three landowners, is moving forward in the Lancaster County court with a full trial expected this summer. The outcome would affect the Keystone XL pipeline route and the power of eminent domain and any possible forced approval of the pipeline that Congress is currently considering.
      Yesterday, the state of Nebraska lost its motion to prevent landowners from adding requests for injunctive relief and lost its motion to block landowners from adding more claims of unconstitutional acts.
      Additionally, the State of Nebraska lost its motion last year to dismiss the lawsuit despite Rep. Lee Terry saying to press just this past week that the case would “be dismissed any day.”
      "Citizens continue to stand up and defend our land and water because politicians like Gov. Heineman sold us out for a foreign corporation who wants nothing more than to take our families hard work to subsidize an export pipeline," said Randy Thompson, plaintiff and landowner. "Eminent domain should never be used for private gain and Gov. Heineman had no right to grant TransCanada the power to take our land against our will for a project that does not even have a permit to build in our country."
      The state law passed in Nebraska establishing a new approval process of the current preferred route for Keystone XL pipeline is being challenged with this lawsuit. The case, filed last year, has passed various legal hurdles with the citizens winning at every stage. The lawsuit contends that the law passed--LB 1161--is unconstitutional by giving the power of eminent domain to the Governor and by giving the Nebraska DEQ authority to review a pipeline route when that power rests with the Nebraska Public Service Commission.
      "Congress would be wise to stay out of trying to force the President to approve the Keystone XL pipeline," said Susan Dunavan, plaintiff and landowner. "The route and process of eminent domain are far from settled in Nebraska. Landowners have rights and will ensure our land and water are protected and our state constitution followed."
      The lawsuit is timely given the national discourse around the pipeline. The most recent ruling in favor of the landowners makes it clear that if the citizens win after the full trial--which will happen this summer--then any route approved for Nebraska is thrown out including [the one included] with the US State Department process.
      David Domina and Brian Jorde of Domina Law Group continue to ensure landowners' rights are protected whether that is in the courtroom or with groups like NEAT helping landowners understand their legal rights and options while managing the constant changing tactics of TransCanada and their land agents.
      "The strength of landowners continues to drive our work," said Brian Jorde, trial lawyer with Domina Law Group. “Lobbyists and politicians must be held accountable when attempting to game the system for personal and private corporate gain. Our state’s constitution is for the people not as a tool to make an easier regulatory path for a privately owned foreign export pipeline. We will continue to defend the constitution and those who are the lifeblood of this great state, our family farmers and ranchers.”

No Keystone XL: rank-and-file unionists should talk to the A.F.L.-C.I.O. suits

Yesterday, AKSARBENT noticed that as Cornhuskers were getting arrested outside the White House defending their land, livelihood and future from Big Oil, pro-goo lobbyists were busy working the phones:

     As the protest was under way, Jack Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute and Sean McGarvey president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. Building and Construction Trades Department, were on a conference call telling reporters that Mr. Obama should approve the pipeline. “It will create thousands of jobs, expand access to secure supplies of Canadian crude oil and represent an investment in America’s economy and energy future consistent with president’s vision in the State of the Union last night,” Mr. Gerard said.
     He said that the petroleum lobby, unions and other pipeline supporters planned a nationwide campaign in favor of the project...

     Exactly why should the A.F.L.-C.I.O. be angling to be a temp service for a fly-by-night job creator, TransCanada, which buys half its Keystone XL steel pipe from outside the USA — pipe found to have, shall we say, "quality issues"?
     Does the A.F.L.-C.I.O. have secret offices and a constituency in India of which AKSARBENT is unaware?
     Four days ago, ThinkProgress informed its readers that in Australia, wind energy is already cheaper than fossil fuels, even without the $23 per metric ton carbon tax. And solar energy is right behind.
     If unions want to get ahead, their leaders should dismount the rust belt nag.
     Nebraska is pathetically behind its neighbors in wind energy construction and exploitation, despite the fact that the state is fourth in wind energy potential.
     Below are a few stark facts, in case some union members want to send a memo to their fearless leaders. By the way, if you noticed that every single state targeted by TransCanada for its pipeline is in the Top Ten of states with an embarrassment of free, wind energy riches, we can only say that we noticed it too, and wonder when union leaders will stop running interference for TransCanada.

Click map to enlarge.

• Texas: 6,527,850 GWh/yr
• Kansas: 3,646,590
• Montana: 3,228,620
• Nebraska: 3,540,370
• South Dakota: 3,411,690
• North Dakota: 2,983,750
• Iowa: 2,026,340
• Wyoming: 1,944,340
• Oklahoma: 1,788,910
• New Mexico: 1,644,970

White House Keystone XL protest: first Sierra Club head in group's 120-year history is arrested for civil disobedience — with preapproval of group's board

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James Tarnick, (second from left), a Nebraska farmer and rancher who said TransCanada has bullied US landowners, is arrested after zip-tying himself to a White House fence in an attempt to help persuade President Obama not to approve the Keystone XL pipeline. Still zip-tied to the fence is Reverend Jim Antal, Minister and President of the Massachusetts Conference of the United Church of Christ. The action, Wednesday, was organized by the Sierra Club, whose executive director, Michael Brune, became the first in the group's history to be arrested for civil disobedience. Photo: Mary Anne Andrei/Bold Nebraska

TransCanada has already admitted that the Keystone XL pipeline will raise gas prices in the US.
     The Keystone One pipeline, to which the Keystone XL will be an addition, leaked at least ten times in its first year of operation.
     Recently, Occupy activists in Texas who slept inside a brand new section of the Keystone XL pipe, awoke to discover that they could see daylight through a weld in the pipe, and took a photo.
     This, in a pipe which will carry an abrasive tar sands goo, thinned by carcinogenic solvents TransCanada will not specifically identify to landowners, pressurized up to 1600 PSI and heated up to 160 degrees in a pipe no thicker than those which carry conventional crude, made of metal often fabricated in India which TransCanada had to dig up in 10 places in Keystone One after government-ordered tests identified possibly defective steel that may have been used in the construction.
     Gee, what could possibly go wrong?
     Oh yeah, this: whistleblowers for a TransCanada subcontractor now claim that software engineers were told to raise the threshold at which the robot inspection "pigs" alert operators of possible problems in the pipe.
     Oh, and this: Keystone XL tar sands oil is even worse that Hillary Clinton and the US State Department have said it is. How much worse? 13%.

Defective Keystone XL welding: shocking evidence revealed in photo taken from inside pipeline

Below: take a good look at a section of the pipeline that Brad Stevens and Americans for Progress-Nebraska are lobbying for. This daylight-leaking gap may exist because the "pigs" used by TransCanada use software that whistleblowers claim is rigged to looser standards than required, allegedly in order to save TransCanada money in pipe replacement.
     This pipe is now buried on a homestead in Winona, Texas, which TransCanada had condemned through eminent domain proceedings. It paid $600 for the legal right to bury the pipe you see below in the backyards of Tina Osby, a 63 year old lifelong resident of Winona, her mother Annie Bircher, 85, and her aunt, Lily Holmes.

That's daylight you see along the weld of a pipe that TransCanada assures the public will safely contain a carcinogenic mix of tar sands oil and additive thinner/s at up to 1600 psi and up to 160 degrees. After being repeatedly questioned
by reporters about the toxic and corrosive nature of tar sands, TransCanada spokesman Terry Cunha said
“TransCanada is not an oil company, and they're not responsible for what goes through their pipes.”
TransCanada has repeatedly refused to identify specifically what additives will travel through its pipeline.

Very early, before dawn on Monday, December 3rd, Glen Collins, Matt Almonte, and Isabel Brooks climbed into a mile long segment of the Keystone XL pipeline and barricaded themselves inside. At sunrise, they were shocked to find light shining through a weld precisely where they were resting. Isabel was to be documenting the police response to Glen and Matt’s protest and had a camera with her. She had time to snap just two photos on her point-and-shoot camera, in extremely low-light before the other concerns that come with being barricaded in a multibillion dollar corporation’s pipeline consumed her interest. With the damning photos in tow, a group of blockaders, including Matt, recently paid visit to the family homestead where the protest occurred. Read more...

Brad Stevens of Americans for Prosperity-Nebraska: fighting to raise gas prices in Nebraska and Midwest and to increase prosperity of billionaire Koch Brothers

Brad Stevens, right, being asked puffball questions
interviewed by Fox's Neil Cavuto

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UPDATE: Shockingly slipshod Keystone XL pipeline construction revealed by activist photo taken inside the pipeline.

Brad Stevens is the president of the Koch Brothers Astroturf organization, Americans for Prosperity — Nebraska. The 40,000-member (really?) organization he heads is now lobbying to transfer the tax burden from income to sales, thereby increasing taxes for 80% of Nebraskans and lowering them for the wealthiest 20% in the state. But Stevens is also working to transfer more money from Nebraskans into the pockets of wealthy people out of state.

Read TransCanada's smoking gun memo about how it plans to
exploit the Keystone XL pipeline to jack up Midwest gas prices
— contrary to cynical disinformation put out by Brad Stevens
and Americans for Prosperity — Nebraska.

     As president of AFP-Nebraska, Stevens is also cheerleader-in-chief for the effort to build the Keystone XL pipeline, an extension to the leaky Keystone One pipeline. Here's the effect that the Keystone XL pipeline will really have on Cornhusker drivers and others, as explained by Greg Palast:

      David and Charles Koch are each worth $20 billion (£12.7 billion), and they’re quite certain that’s not enough. And so they need the XL Keystone Pipeline.
      The XL Keystone will take Canadian tar-sands oil, the filthiest crude on the planet, and suck it down to Texas’ Gulf Coast refineries. Alberta’s oil-glop reserve, if it can get to the US market, will warm the planet by nearly 0.4°C all by itself.
      Why in the world would America pistol-whip Mother Nature to bring oil to Texas? I mean, it’s just plain weird to suck heavy tar oil out of Canada to drag it across the entire middle of the USA and import it into the oil-exporting Lone Star State.
      ...It would cost billions of dollars to rebuild the giant Flint Hills Corpus Christi Refinery, owned by Koch Industries, to use the less-polluting Texas oil drilled nearby.
      The Kochs need heavy crude. But the Brothers Koch have a problem. Heavy crude is controlled by a heavy dude – President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela.
      In case you haven’t heard, the US Department of Energy now says Venezuela, not Saudi Arabia, has the world’s largest petroleum reserve – including the overwhelming bulk of the planet’s heavy crude.
      And Chavez is not giving it away...
     So the Kochs have turned their gaze upward – to Canada, where Alberta oil men are selling their tar-sands gunk for a whopping $33 (£21) a barrel less than Chavez’s heavy... switching from Venezuela heavy to Canadian tar could put an extra $3 billion (£1.9 billion) a year into the pockets of the Kochs.
 
     However, there’s a problem. Between Canada and Houston is the United States. At the moment, there’s no pipeline that can take all that cheap crude south. The southbound pipeline network now chokes at Cushing, Oklahoma, which is already blocked with 47 million barrels of crude sitting in storage tanks with nowhere to go.
      So all the Kochs have to do is get the US government to agree to pop a pipe through Cushing to Houston: the Keystone XL...
     Let me repeat: Approving the Keystone XL Pipeline will raise the price of oil and gasoline.
     ...As matters stand, with nowhere to dump their tar goo, Canadians have to sell at a $33 (£21) a barrel discount to nearby refineries in the US Upper Midwest.
     American consumers are getting the benefit of this oil backup.
      ...The result of opening the spigot through the XL Keystone will mean that US Midwest retail heating oil prices will skyrocket and gasoline in the region, as the crude drains away to other refineries, will rise an estimated 15 cents a gallon.
     ...The gusher of cheap crude from a new pipeline will enrich the refiners – none more so than refiners named Koch.