Environmental activists have fought tooth and nail to block the construction of the Keystone Pipeline, which would carry approximately 830,000 barrels of oil per day from the oil sands in Alberta, Canada south to refineries in the U.S.
Opponents argue that its construction may exacerbate global warming, accidents may wreak havoc on the surrounding environment and processing the gunk from the oil sands requires more energy to refine, thereby leaving a higher footprint.
However, after years of research, there should be little doubt about the big picture: constructing the Keystone Pipeline will have a negligible environmental impact and will provide a much-needed boost to our economy by creating thousands of jobs.
A study released by the State Department as part of its environmental impact survey severely undercuts the arguments of the project’s detractors. According to the State Department’s conclusions, allowing the firm TransCanada to build Keystone XL is unlikely to have significant effects on climate change causing greenhouse emissions. This is because the construction of the Keystone Pipeline, or lack thereof, is not going to affect the extraction of the crude oil.
Canada is firmly committed to selling the crude oil in Alberta to the international market with or without the U.S. on board, and if we don’t move forward on the project, then China will.
Joe Oliver, the Canadian Minister of Natural Resources, issued a veiled threat to find other buyers in a 2012 press release stating that, “Ninety-nine percent of our oil exports currently flow to the United States. [Obama’s decision in 2012 to delay the project]… underlines the importance of diversifying and expanding our markets, including the growing Asian market, to help ensure the financial security of Canadians and families for decades to come.”
Much to the chagrin of environmental activists, the crude oil will be extracted anyway—with or without the pipeline; if President Obama uses his veto power to block the project, then instead of travelling via a highly regulated pipeline that we ourselves could monitor, the crude oil will continue to travel, as it has for many years, by rail and barge to the international market.
“Approval or denial of any one crude oil transport project, including the proposed [Keystone XL pipeline], remains unlikely to significantly impact the rate of extraction in the oil sands, or the continued demand for heavy crude oil at refineries in the U.S.,” the report by the State Department said.
The study by the State Department also found that travel by rail and barge produces higher greenhouse emissions; additionally, these methods of travel carry a higher likelihood of accident. Some of the rail routes studied by the State Department could result in three to eight times the volume of oil spilled.
The report adds that, if producers in Canada are forced to ship the crude oil by rail or truck instead of the pipeline, then the added emissions by the trains and trucks transporting the oil could increase the overall transportation emissions by 28 to 42 percent.
“The net effects of the pipeline’s impact on our climate will be absolutely critical to determining whether this project is allowed to go forward,” Obama said last year. Well, the State Department gave him an answer; now, it’s time for Obama to stop his incessant foot-dragging on this widely supported endeavor. Americans overwhelmingly are in favor of moving forward with the project: a June 2014 poll by the Pew Research Center indicates that 61 percent of Americans support it.
The economic benefits of this project are impossible to ignore: the State Department’s review found that it would create 42,000 jobs during its two-year construction. Additionally, it will contribute $3.4 billion to the economy, which equates to 0.02 percent of the entire U.S. GDP.
For a president who has sought to use infrastructure as a means of resuscitating America’s recovering economy, the irony of delaying this project is striking: the Keystone Pipeline is a privately built, shovel-ready piece of infrastructure that would create thousands of jobs; moreover, studies by the State Department have demonstrated that the environmental effects would be negligible, especially since the crude oil will be refined anyway.
Fighting for rational climate policies is of course a worthy endeavor; yet, even if Obama vetoes the project, the victory for environmentalists would be more symbolic than valuable. Instead of focusing on this issue, environmental activists should devote their time, money and enthusiasm toward battling for policies that might actually advance their end goals.