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Keystone XL: The Litmus Test for Obama’s Second Term

Nov. 12, 2012 12:35am

Thomas J. Pyle is the president of the American Energy Alliance (AEA). In this capacity, Pyle brings a unique backdrop of public and private sector experience […]

Thomas J. Pyle is the president of the American Energy Alliance (AEA). In this capacity, Pyle brings a unique backdrop of public and private sector experience to help manage AEA’s Washington, DC-based staff and operations. He also helps to develop the organization’s free market policy positions and implement education efforts with respect to key energy stakeholders, including policymakers, federal agency representatives, industry leaders, consumer entities and the media. Previously, Pyle was the founder of his own consulting firm, Pyle Consulting, Inc., an active public affairs consulting firm with a wide range of private and not-for-profit customers. Prior to starting his own firm, Pyle served as vice president of the Rhoads Group in Washington, DC where he represented and advised a variety of association and corporate clients in meeting their strategic public policy goals and priorities. Additionally, he also served as director of federal affairs for a major integrated manufacturing and services company focusing on energy, environment, regulatory and transportation issues. Before coming to the private sector, Pyle held numerous positions on Capitol Hill including serving a policy analyst for the Majority Whip of the U.S. House of Representatives and as staff director for the Congressional Western Caucus, as well as other legislative staff positions. Pyle holds a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Southern California.

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The Keystone XL pipeline is about to mark its fourth anniversary in bureaucratic limbo. Now that President Obama has secured a second term, the pipeline’s approval is largely viewed as a no-brainer. It should not be a foregone conclusion, if not for this president’s record of mismatched rhetoric and actions. When thousands of anti-Keystone XL pipeline demonstrators assemble in front of the White House on November 18, President Obama will have the opportunity to show the nation that he actually is a pro-energy, pro-jobs president. On the flip side, he can continue to side step this crucial pipeline project and keep thousands of new energy jobs on hold.

Pyle: Approving Keystone XL Is a No Brainer

Actress Daryl Hannah was among the Keystone XL protesters last summer who were arrested in front of the White House (AP Photo)

In his re-election speech, President Obama reassured voters – whether they voted for him or not – that he has listened to them. If that were truly the case, then approval of the Keystone XL pipeline should not be a difficult decision for Obama. A survey commissioned earlier this year by the American Energy Alliance found that 79 percent of the Americans support construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. It’s easy to see why, considering that the pipeline would ensure stable oil supplies, tens of thousands of good-paying jobs, and strengthen trade with our closest ally, Canada. Many Americans would agree that these are all worthwhile goals, especially creating new jobs in the current economic atmosphere. Part of the reason unemployment has remained stubbornly high is because of the Administration’s regulatory barriers to job creation in the private sector. Keystone XL is a great example of this.

In the time that President Obama has delayed his decision on the Keystone XL pipeline, Americans have spent more than $24 billion to purchase overseas oil. Meanwhile, upwards of 20,000 Americans that could have been put to work through its construction remain on the unemployment roster. In addition to work at construction sites, these jobs would also be at American refineries once oil is flowing through the pipeline. This employment boost could be realized by a simple swipe of the president’s pen, and would not require a helping hand from the American taxpayer.

Most Americans would also agree that we need to reduce our oil imports from hostile nations abroad. With the pipeline projected to deliver 700,000 barrels of oil each day to consumers, and presuming that the global price of crude trades at roughly $100 per barrel, construction of the Keystone pipeline could prevent Americans from sending $70 million every day overseas to purchase imports.

Because they cannot refute these facts, the demonstrators gathering in front of the White House this month will contend that the pipeline spells unequivocal environmental destruction. This argument prevails among the anti-Keystone movement despite the State Department’s confirmation that a new pipeline would have a limited environmental impact, much less so than transport by barge, truck, or railcar.

And then there’s the argument that the pipeline will increase greenhouse gas emissions. There is yet to be a valid argument in response to the fact that the pipeline – whether it’s built along the proposed route or not – will, in fact, be built. The oil it transports will be injected into the global supply – if not in the U.S., perhaps in energy-hungry China.

The president can pursue two paths in his second term. The first path is to find middle ground and pursue policies that are in line with his campaign pledge for an “all of the above” energy policy. If he’s genuinely committed to increased oil and gas production, how can he reject a much-needed infrastructure investment that’s necessary to transport these resources? The second path is to ignore our vast North American energy resources and placate the radical, environmentalist fringe with regulatory policies that promote energy poverty.

The choice is his.

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Comments (32)

JeffMT
Posted on November 15, 2012 at 12:51pm
http://billingsgazette.com/news/opinion/editorial/gazette-opinion/gazette-opinion-pipeline-can-be-approved-in-with-new-neb/article_e50b87b6-c4b4-5c5d-b995-aea567bff81c.html
“Pipeline can be approved in 2013 with new Neb. route”
Billings Gazette
11/14/12
This editorial by the Billings Gazette also includes the project timeline, a map of the old and new proposed routes thru Nebraska and a link, shown below, to the new draft evaluation summary

http://journalstar.com/pipeline-draft-evaluation-report—executive-summary/pdf_b076fba8-115e-5772-ad60-1029b6be3076.html#.UJ0exeQriN0.email
Pipeline draft evaluation summary
Lincoln Journal Star

Approve is project NOW!!!

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sharonbaby
Posted on November 14, 2012 at 1:51am
good article!
http://www.herostart.com/productshow/welded-fitting

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hannah
Posted on November 13, 2012 at 4:14pm
Canada doesn’t need the U.S. to run an oil line, they were just asking them first. Now with obummer back in the chair allot of people will have to wait allot longer for a job because obummer doesn’t want the people to work, he wants them all dependant on him. Good bye XL pipeline. ;(

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hades3
Posted on November 13, 2012 at 4:12pm
Want the XL pipeline approved ?? Have all the thousands of miles of pipelines that transport natural gas , gasoline and diesel underground across the USA shut down for 48 hours. Those who oppose the Xl pipeline would be begging for the pipeline.

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hannah
Posted on November 13, 2012 at 4:11pm
The only people who want the XL pipeline are the ones who want a frickin job, the ones who voted dumbass obama back in want to sit in a chair or better yet, lie in bed a do crack all day and night. They could care less how their welfare cheques get to them as long as they do. They’re so uneducated they think obummer sends the cheques from a room full of his own money. They will soon learn that without the other half working and paying taxes they will have to wait until hell freezes over for their next one, ;)

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lwilli201
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 8:15pm
How many O voters even know the definition of an environmentalist. When those voters see gas prices go up, notice that that food stamp card does not buy as much food as it did last week, wait in long lines for health care and the electric bill get to high to pay, they will turn on O and he would be very stupid if he did not know this. Hell, they could turn on him if they found out that Environmentalist are angry, rich, white people. Why didn’t OWS go after them? O did not need the enviro vote, he did need their money. Now that he has been reelected, I would not be surprised if he throws them under the bus because he owes the unions more.

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BaltimoreJoe
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 7:21pm
My understanding is the the Fed. must approve any pipeline that crosses a U.S. border, at least it was reported that way when folks wanted to know why BHo was even involved. If that is true I don’t see why the states, all of which now have approved routes, just don’t partner with the builder and build the thing up to 100 yrds from the Canadian border. Then submit the last hundred yard pipeline to the Fed. They will be hard pressed to find any snail-darters in that last hundred yards. Oil folks have already said they would use parts of the XL to reroute existing flows that travel aged systems… If you look at a map of the U.S. with pipeline routes you will we’re already covered with them.

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- kralspaces
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 9:12pm
  Build it from North Dakota to Texas first. Start pumping ND oil until the next administration allows the pipeline across the border. Otherwise, China will build a pipeline across Canada to the Pacific. Then what?
  
  Report this comment
- JeffMT
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 10:38pm
  BaltimoreJoe:
  Cost is the big reason – what company is going to dump many millions into the ground in the form of a pipeline that may never be used? None. The company’s board of directors would fire the CEO for doing something like that.
  
  As far as states partnering to do this, the same issue is in play – cost. What state’s legislature and governor are going to spend big money to build something that may never get used and that they have no control over getting approved. None. Montana is where the XL pipeline will cross the US/Canadian border and I guarantee you Montana does not have the money to build the portion of the pipeline that will run thru Montana.
  
  Conceptually, I get your point but realistically no one is going to take the chance on spending all of that money for nothing when they cannot control the outcome of the federal government’s decision regarding that 50 feet of border crossing between the US and Canada.
  
  Think of it this way – if that were a viable alternative, it would have been done already. This whole thing is not about finding any environmental issues at the border crossing, there is nothing but rangeland/prairie there. There is nothing out there. This delay is all about DC politics and that’s all.
  
  Report this comment
progressiveslayer
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 7:06pm
The Marxist mulatto will kill any pipeline,kill the coal industry and not allow exploitation of our natural resources.We have 1.5 trillion barrels of shale oil that won’t be exploited,we have more NG than any other country that won’t be exploited. He’ll continue to waste billions on a failed green energy policy that won’t work and we have evidence that it doesn’t work. Spain went the so called green energy route and it got them 20% unemployment and skyrocketing energy costs.

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- BaltimoreJoe
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 7:27pm
  But women’s private parts belong to them in Spain…. occasionally getting loaned out no doubt but hey, not like in the U.S. where women flocked to the polls for BHo to protect their private parts from RnR.
  
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- progressiveslayer
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 7:42pm
  Obamazombies will believe anything won’t they? Simpletons in our society that plague us,parasitical pustules oozing worthlessness.
  
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TeaPartyanimal
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 6:58pm
The Drill Nazi!

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INTOODEEP
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 4:45pm
Obumbler will never ok the Keystone pipeline, he is hell bent on bringing this country to it’s knees. I think a nationwide tax revolt is needed to bring his administration to its knees. Come Jan. 01 we should all go tax exempt on our payroll taxes, bet they cant last 2 months…!

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canada 1958
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 3:33pm
hear are the truth i live in alberta canada the home of the oil sands. obama will not let this pipeline through. reason his buddy bill gates purchaed a major stock in cn rail now this rail company is hauling 400,000 barrels of oil to the usa from canada ata cost of 38.00 a barrel that almost 3 times the price to put it in a pipeline.his other buddy warren buffet also ownes a rail line so if obama lets the pipeline throgh his two best buddys will lose millions in extra transport cost. and here is the kikker if you put it in a pipline you have to have an enviromental rigamarole. but if its by train you do not have to have an enviromental impact study. so this project is never going to happen it may go through in his last year as he is the type to burn his party in the end as he hates these white folks like bill and warren he just covers it because he needed there money

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BlackCrow
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 2:46pm
Idiots. We are up to our armpits in idiots!

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Major121
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 2:09pm
Yes, we need the oil. I don’t dispute that.

But — It really bothers me how conservatives overlook the private property rights associated with this. It still goes through northern Nebraska, through an area that IS Sandhills, although the Nebraska DEQ has refused to designate it as such. To completely avoid the Sandhills, Transcananda would have to change their entry point into the state of Nebraska, which would be a major inconvenience for them, so the DEQ has accomodated them with this in their Sandhills designation. Instead landowners are going to be forced to have this pipeline on their land, and most of them do not want to take on what they consider to be significant risks associated with this pipeline that could damage their water and soil. Believe me, these ranchers know their land better than any government official, and they know that if a leak occurred, especially on a wet year, it would probably be impossible for Transcanada to contain it.

Why should landowners be forced to put something on their land that they don’t want, especially from a foreign company? A better solution would be to move the pipeline to eastern Nebraska, again a major inconvenience for Transcanada since it changes the entry point into the state. But, there is already another pipeline here, and it was much better received by the landowners.

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- Dano.50
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 5:23pm
  I don’t buy your argument.
  
  I used to ranch in the Great Sand Hills in southern Saskatchewan and a pretty big pipeline runs smack through it. Plus there are tons of gas wells, and trenched in pipelines and once things are buried you’d never know it was there.
  
  If you’re going to go with the “What if policy” then quit driving or using a vehicle. More people are killed and inured in a week than, decades of pipeline disasters.
  
  And you know what farmers and ranchers do here?
  
  They insist in the contract that THEY do the land reclamation on the buried pipelines.
  
  Not only does this absolve the oil companies for the responsibility of returning to nature, but some farmers and ranchers rake in a small fortune and even start small businesses for doing reclamation work.
  
  We used to make more money on a half ton load of crested wheat grass seed, than a full semi load of wheat.
  
  Then the environmentalists decided crested wheat grass was a noxious weed, (It’s hay, and spring grazing so native grasses can remain untouched until past their growing season and seed production. Which also allows native grass to set deeper roots, thus better surviving drought. So go figure.)
  
  In any case, native grasses have to now be planted, but that only means the oil companies are charged even more for seed as not all native varieties produce seed every year.
  
  Stop listening to these greenie morons who learn their agricultural sciences from Al Bore leg clingers.
  
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- Major121
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 7:14pm
  Dano – I am sure that the reclamation process works for many areas, but the very people that know the Nebraska Sandhills, the landowners, don’t trust Transcanada with it. If the landowners were okay with it, I would have a lot less of a problem with it.
  
  I have never been to Saskatchewan, so I don’t know that it’s similar to the Nebraska Sandhills. I did grow up in the very area they are wanting to put the pipeline in and I do understand the concerns of the farmers and ranchers there. I am listening to the landowners (not the greenie morons), and yes, I have talked with some of them.
  
  I guess my biggest conern, as a conservative, is what about their private property rights?
  
  Report this comment
Micmac
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 2:02pm
Keystone XL is truly a test for NoBama. If he nixes it then his “jobs creation in the private sector” speech would be an outright lie. No surprise there. If he is to approve it I am sure it will be an union contract, as this is the only way he will approve private sector jobs.

How in the hell does someone get so much unilateral control? Because congress is a bunch of wimps, more concerned about re-election and less about the country’s future. Boehner is a classic example. I call him the CaveMan, cuz that’s all he does. But he’s just one of many. Even your idol West is a total RINO. Look at how many voted for NDAA, for example. There is a systemic problem that overlays the current government, and this is what needs to be addressed. Both parties have moved so far to the left that there is no right, except the one taken over by the evangelicals, who 30 years ago were looked at as kooks and hypocrites, as they couldn’t keep it in their pants.

My conclusion is that there are problems on all sides, not just the WH. If the R’s could really put their heads together properly, and think not thru their derrieres, NoBama, Reid, etc. could be neutralized/nutered.

The R’s have moved left, but have no understanding of where they are. They have no forward thinkers…actually no current thinkers…just those that follow party agendas, no matter how out of touch and arcane.

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- BaltimoreJoe
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 7:32pm
  How many lies and crimes has the media already spun for our criminal in chief?
  His own energy czar Stephen Chu is featured on a youtube video saying the U.S. gas price must be and will be driven to the same levels as within Europe, which was $8-9/gallon at the time. Yet people believe the spin and will not see it for themselves. Gotta truly hit bottom.
  
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JeffMT
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 1:54pm
Here’s a new twist to consider – Montana is where the XL pipeline will cross from Canada to the US. Current (and soon to be former, due to term limits) Dem. Montana governor Schweitzer has supported the XL pipeline. Although he is a lib, he was smart enough to understand the need for the pipeline from both energy and employment standpoints. Also, he knew he had Hillary sitting in DC and she would stop it so he didn’t have to.

Now, however, Montana just elected a left wing liberal environmentalist as its governor, Steve Bullock. Also, Hillary will not be around much longer to hold this project up. Therefore, the Obama admin. needs someone else to slow the XL project down for two more years until after the 2014 mid-terms without actually stopping it. That’s where Bullock comes in.

He can be the new obstructionist regarding this project for the next two years under the guise of needing to do further environmental studies, safety studies, blah, blah, blah. This will give the Admin. cover and will make a lib media rock star out of Bullock. That will allow him to raise millions of out of state $ from the enviros for his re-election campaign in 2016.

By doing this the Admin. wins, Bullock wins, the enviros win and the libs win. Then Bullock can step out of the way after two years as he starts to prepare for his re-election campaign and let the feds resume their obstruction of this project until O leaves office.

Elections have consequences.

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- JeffMT
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 2:16pm
  I am sorry to have to point out what I did in my post above but I think it is something people need to be aware of. Bullock was heavily funded by out of state enviros so he owes them some political payback. Holding up the XL pipeline would be a win-win for both of them so don’t be surprised if it happens.
  
  Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I work in the oil and gas industry and would love to have seen XL built years ago such that it was on line as I write this. I really have doubts now as to whether it will ever be built. Maybe when 99% of us are sitting around in the dark freezing to death and gas is $10/gallon …
  
  Did someone say “Atlas Shrugged”?
  
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Kalkren
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 1:28pm
Liberals and Progressives think the energy is made from Harry Potter’s Wand. The fact is that we will use more energy we have to. To think other wise is utterly stupidity. This is I believe is a universal fact-The more technology and/or population growth the energy will be needed- This is a fact and I dare anyone to make an argument against it. If an alien race traveling through space came to Earth and they only has 25-million population total. The amount of energy they would have to use to travel through out space would multiple times larger all the energy we use today. As long as these Liberals and Progressives want their IPods, IPads and state of the art phones that can tweet and make dinner the need for more energy will grow. Just because Ms Hannah can vacation in Vale and travel first class and live in a large and nice home doesn’t give her the right to ask the rest of us not to want the same thing. Oil prices goes up one reason is that the rest of the world want carpets, TV, computers and phones that can tweet and make dinner too. So until some break through happens with Solar, wind, and such we need energy.

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jessieH
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 1:17pm
When you start a war against another Nation, you shut down their fuel supply & take over their comunications. So far, Osama Obama is batting a thousand.

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- Morningglory
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 3:01pm
  Exactly!
  
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- e.galle
  Posted on November 12, 2012 at 10:17pm
  And you weaken their military….ie down Paetraus (an American hero), CIA caused Benghazi, NASA down, UN agendas that will take away guns & freedom of speech. Oh its a full on scenerio right out of Hollywood. 51% viewers the rest paying their way.
  
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rikyt74
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 1:09pm
If you want oil you will have to get it from Mosseshells **** because NO! Keystone pipeline!

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thegodfather
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 12:37pm
I’m sorry, but the Obama energy policy is very…”What comes from the ground….STAYS in the ground”….

Even if you somehow can “beam up” the oil, like a Star Trek transporter, the answer is still NO. Liberals are sure that the “beaming up” process, would alter the atomic structure of the Earth, it’s rocks and dirt….oh yea…and the Earthworms too.

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searcher619
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 12:35pm
With Obama waging war on coal and talking about a carbon tax I seriously doubt he wants to move our country any closer to energy independence. If anything it looks like he wants to do the opposite.

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Lord_Frostwind
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 12:33pm
Well, now that he’s free from the election concerns it will be fun to see which of his supporters he messes over first. Labor or environmentalists, I wonder which the President cares more about?

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nana1212
Posted on November 12, 2012 at 12:30pm
The day this president commits himself to anything for America’s sake is a joke! He would rather keep in touch with the muslim countries instead.

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