Former Clinton Honcho Now Key TransCanada Lobbyist

Speaking of lobbyists, Hillary Clinton isn't to be trusted, either.

Via Great Plains Tar Sands Pipelines, I learn that Friends of the Earth is alarmed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton isn't one of them. Apparently, one Paul Elliott was national deputy director and chief of staff for delegate selection for Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign. Paul Elliott is now a chief lobbyist for TransCanada in Washington, D.C. TransCanada needs Secretary Clinton to approve construction of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.

“TransCanada clearly sees an opportunity to get this dangerous pipeline approved through Secretary Clinton's relationship with Paul Elliott,” said Alex Moore, dirty fuels campaigner at Friends of the Earth. “Mr. Elliott’s influence in the State Department’s consideration of the pipeline is yet another reason we believe that the White House should reassign review of this project. The stakes for the public are too high to have anything but rigorous and fair scrutiny of the environmental risks of this controversial pipeline and tar sands oil” [Friends of the Earth, press release, 2010.12.13].

Friends of the Earth says Clinton should recuse herself from the Keystone XL decision-making process. Clinton has already caught heck from Nebraska's leaders for saying she's inclined to approve the pipeline. Is there any chance our current South Dakota Congressional delegation, or maybe our lobby-favorite Congresswoman-elect, will join in turning up the heat on Clinton for her Big-Oil-lobbyist connections?

Nebraska Farmers Union Opposes Keystone XL

Governor Heineman Washes Hands of Dirty Oil,
Disses Constituents with Double Standard

Nebraska is a welcome hotbed of activity on the Keystone XL pipeline. The Nebraska Farmers Union packed the house last Friday with a debate on the proposed tar sands pipeline. TransCanada spokesman Jeff Rauh squared off with Plains Justice advocate Paul Blackburn. Robert Pore's account in the Grand Island Independent is worth reading. Plains Justice apparently won the day: afterward, the Nebraska Farmers Union passed a resolution formally opposing the Keystone XL pipeline.

Also speaking on Keystone XL (among other topics) at the Nebraska Farmers Union annual meeting was Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman. During a Q&A, a member of Keystone XL opponent Bold Nebraska asked Governor Heineman to join Senator Mike Johanns in calling for a better study of the pipeline's potential impact on the Nebraska Sand Hills and Ogallala Aquifer.

Governor Heineman's response:

But Heineman accused Bold Nebraska of playing politics with the pipeline issue. Heienman then referred to the Democratic administration in answering the question.

"This is a federal regulatory issue," Heineman said. "There are two people who can stop it -- President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton -- and that is where our focus ought to be."

Heineman said he appreciates Johanns' efforts and is supportive of it and has sent correspondence to Clinton expressing concerns Nebraskans have about the pipeline project and its proposed route through the Sandhills and across the Ogallala Aquifer.

"Maybe that route needs to change or maybe they don't even go forward with it," he said. "But that is where the decision is -- it is a federal regulatory issue and there's nothing we can do at the state level, at this time, to prevent that. Maybe in the future, but not on this particular one" [Robert Pore, "Merits of Proposed Oil Pipeline Debated at Farmers Union Convention," Grand Island Independent, 2010.12.03].

Fascinating: a Republican governor who doesn't think state-level activists should "play politics" with federal issues. This from a member of the Republican Party that is playing politics with unemployment benefits, the START treaty, and everything else on Congress's agenda in order to get huge tax breaks for rich people who don't need them and won't stimulate the economy. This from a governor who himself is playing politics with federal health care legislation and with the clearly federal issue of immigration.

Governor Heineman has acknowledged environmental concerns about TransCanada's Keystone XL. He now needs to get consistent and apply some of that Republican states-rights backbone to this issue and fight for a better route for the pipeline... or no pipeline at all.

Nebraska Politicos Speaking up on TransCanada; SD Pols Asleep at Switch

Opposition is rising to the TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline in Nebraska, and it's prettyhard to dismiss these folks as "extreme environmentalists." U.S. Senator Mike Johanns has demanded more information and a different route for the pipeline to protect the sensitive Nebraska Sand Hills and Ogallala Aquifer. Nebraska farmer and State Senator Annette Dubas is leading an interim legislative study of Keystone XL's potential impacts on the state (see the documentation on LR435 here). That committee plans to look into liability, restoration of property, and regulatory oversight.

Nebraska State Senator Tony Fulton apparently shares concerns that Keystone XL could be bad for his state. Even Governor Dave Heineman is worried about Keystone XL's environmental impacts, although he thinks (erroneously) that Nebraska may lack the authority to impose its own environmental regulations over federal rules. (Where there's a will, there's a way, Gov. Heineman!)

This growing opposition comes on the heels of a new report from Plains Justice that finds TransCanada isn't putting enough resources into pipeline emergency response here on the Plains. According to Plains Justice, in all of Nebraska and the Dakotas, TransCanada has in place "one spill response trailer and one boom trailer that together contain 5,000 feet of boom, two skimmers, two portable tanks, and a variety of hand tools and equipment. It has also provided a 14 ft. and 18 ft. boat." Compare that to the Enbridge spill near Kalamazoo, Michigan, last summer. In response to a rupture in a 30-inch oil pipeline, same size as Keystone I and smaller than the 36-inch Keystone XL, Enbridge deployed "over 2,000 personnel, over 150,000 feet (28 miles) of boom, 175 heavy spill response trucks, 43 boats, and 48 oil skimmers." Given those numbers, TransCanada looks woefully underprepared to respond to a pipeline spill here on our prairie.

Nebraska lawmakers are at least willing to ask Big Foreign Oil some hard questions. It's too bad South Dakota lawmakers won't show similar moxie:

• Governor-Elect Dennis Daugaard has defended big tax rebates for the construction of TransCanada's pipelines, rebates that neither Nebraska nor North Dakota offer.
• State Senator and Majority Leader Russell Olson thinks those rebates and those pipelines are wonderful. He has consistently resisted efforts to impose pipeline taxes to establish environmental clean-up funds. Maybe Rep.-Elect Patricia Stricherz can straighten him out.
  
• Neither Senator John Thune (of course not) nor Senator Tim Johnson (Tim! You're our only hope!) signed on to a letter from eleven fellow senators criticizing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for her apparent pro-pipeline bias.
• I can't find any public comment on Keystone XL from Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin or Rep. Elect Kristi Noem.

Is South Dakota so desperate for economic development that we can't ask a foreign oil corporation to take sufficient precautions to prepare for the inevitable accidents on its pipeline? Nebraska evidently doesn't suffer this spinelessness; South Dakota should find its voice and join the calls to put our environmental and economic well-being above TransCanada's drive for maximum profit.

Thanks! Shorter Sentences, No Earthquakes, Generous Democrats

Some dressing for your turkey:

• Thankful cons: Governor M. Michael Rounds has brought 270 state prison inmates a few months closer to saying goodbye to creamed turkey on toast. The governor issued a batch of sentence reductions yesterday. Lake County's only winner: our own Stephanie Schumacher, who gets 90 days off her sentence. These commutations weren't free passes; inmates had to do 320 hours of community service, earn GEDs or firefighter certifications, or assist with special projects.
• Thankful for solid ground: We don't have much in the way of earthquakes in South Dakota. With the Keystone pipeline running underneath us and Keystone XL maybe joining it, Plains Justice reminds us we'd better hope it stays that way. Let's not go fault-finding....
• Thankful for Democrats: the new Congressional Republicans eager to activate their government health insurance face some calls to reject their own federal health coverage before they repeal Obamacare. A Public Policy Polling survey finds 53% of Americans think incoming freshpeople like Rep.-Elect Kristi Noem who campaigned against health care reform ought to reject their Congressional health coverage. 33% think they should take the Congressional benefit. Republicans and Independents are much harder on their freshpeople; Dems make the Reject! call by only a 40–46 margin. (I'm not so generous, Kristi: as insurance agents, you and Bryon can surely come up with a better policy on your own, right?)

TransCanada Notes: Nebraska Regulations, SD Pipe Yard... and Oily Wind?

At least some Nebraska counties are taking action to keep TransCanada in line if it builds the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline through their territory. In York County (down where US 81 meets I-80), corn producers are asking the county commission to regulate the construction timeframe, pipeline depth, and pipeline reclamation to protect local agriculture. Holt County in north central Nebraska has already passed some significant pipeline regulations in anticipation of Keystone XL.

Meanwhile, TransCanada keeps trying to force landowners into silence about the project, something one Ernie Fellows of Keya Paha County doesn't much care for:

Fellows, a Keya Paha county landowner who lives near Mills, said he believes the company’s tactics and closed meetings with Landowners for Fairness (LFF) violate his rights.

“I belong to LFF. I have the right to say no. I have the right to speak. Having to sign a nondisclosure statement violates my civil rights,” he said [LuAnn Schindler, "Proposed Pipeline Has Some Property Owners Asking Questions," Norfolk Daily News, 2010.10.26].

Meanwhile, TransCanada is still getting its Keystone XL ducks in a row here in South Dakota. TransCanada rep Michael Calhoun checked with Butte County commissioners last week to make sure his company had the right permits for a pipe yard that mostly out-of-state workers will use as a staging ground for construction of the pipeline. Butte County has no zoning regulations, so TransCanada is good to go...

...assuming, of course, that the State Department approves TransCanada's permit request. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made some pro-Keystone XL noise last month, which earned her guff from both of Nebraska's U.S. Senators and some other folks... but no word that I've heard from South Dakota's Congressional delegation.

On the bright side, even as TransCanada threatens to profit from prolonging our addiction to dirty foreign oil, the Canadian company is also boosting wind power here in the States. At the beginning of the month, TransCanada finished construction on the 132-megawatt Kibby Wind project in Eustis, Maine. When those windmills are at full tilt, they'll provide enough juice for 50,000 homes.

Dang it: even those land-grabbing Canadian fossil-fuel peddlers can do something right every now and then.

Center for Rural Affairs: Keystone XL Wrong Solution for U.S. Energy, Prairie Economy

Hat tip to Great Plains Tar Sands Pipelines!

Remember that corporate claptrap our state senator Russell Olson (R-8/Madison) was spewing about why he voted to give TransCanada millions of dollars in tax refunds for the Keystone I pipeline so South Dakota could enjoy all sorts of economic and energy security benefits, even though North Dakota and Nebraska got the same benefits without giving away any such refunds?

Well, the Center for Rural Affairs weighs in on the pending Keystone XL pipeline to say those benefits don't outweigh the risks to our environment and our economic future. Last week, the Center for Rural Affairs declared its opposition to Keystone XL:

"America must focus on better approaches to securing the energy it needs by developing renewable energy, especially renewable approaches to fueling cars," said John Crabtree, Media Director at the Center for Rural Affairs. "We support developing clean energy resources that we have right here in Nebraska, like wind energy, not increasing our reliance on dirty, foreign energy that we have to pipe in from afar."

The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that securing oil from tar sands and delivering it to U.S. refineries results in nearly double the greenhouse gas emissions as other oil delivered to U.S. refineries.

According to Crabtree, in the long-run, hybrid electric cars powered by renewable sources such as wind and low carbon biofuels will create more jobs and far greater economic opportunity in rural America while confronting the very real threat of climate change [Center for Rural Affairs, press release, 2010.10.12].

Crabtree cites TransCanada's willingness to cut corners with thinner steel and its strong-arm tactics against Nebraska landowners as further reason that Big Oil boosters like Senator Olson are putting the interests of foreign oil corporations ahead of the interests of rural America.

Senator Johanns: Move Keystone XL Away from Ogallala Aquifer and Sand Hills

Hat tip to Great Plains Tar Sands Pipelines!

Here's what I've been waiting for: A Republican to stand up to TransCanada and try to protect his constituents from the Keystone XL pipeline. Senator Mike Johanns of Nebraska wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton this week to declare that he cannot support the Keystone XL pipeline based on the information thus far presented by TransCanada and the State Department in its inadequate draft environmental impact statement (DEIS).

Routes of TransCanada Keystone pipeline system, with initial/projected maximum oil capacities. Image from Great Plains Tar Sands Pipelines.

Senator Johanns shares the concern of many Nebraskans and other folks who drink water that Keystone XL poses an unacceptable risk to the Ogallala Aquifer, which supplies (Johanns quotes from the DEIS) "78% of the public water supply and 83% of irrigation water in Nebraska." Johanns also objects to the absence of substantial discussion of the unique Sandhills ecosystem, whose sandy soils might allow oil spills to penetrate the soil faster than they would elsewhere.

Senator Johanns hammers on the point that the DEIS assumes Keystone XL must cross the border at Morgan, Montana. He acknowledges that the nearly straight line from Morgan to Steele City, Nebraska, crosses the least land and thus poses what on paper looks like less environmental impact than routes that detour here and there from that straight line.

So the Senator from Nebraska proposes a whole 'nother route:

Understanding the primary role that distance plays in the consideration of pipeline alternative routes, I was disturbed by the fact that the DEIS contains no substantial discussion of a route that would run parallel to the existing Keystone route from Steele City, Nebraska, north to the U.S. border in Cavalier County, North Dakota. This route would be far shorter than the proposed route, and shorter than every alternative considered in the DEIS. And if—as the DEIS has argued—shorter distance generally coincides with a less severe environmental impact, then one could conclude that such a route would be better for the environment [Senator Mike Johanns, letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, 2010.10.14].

Uff da. Check that map: The purple dashed line is the hypotenuse Johanns doesn't like. The red line is the Keystone I route that runs through eastern South Dakota.

Now there's a tricky question: do we cause less environmental damage by digging a new, shorter route or by laying Keystone XL along the longer existing route? Do we double the leak risk for eastern South Dakota, or do we split the risk with our West River neighbors? Do we subject a whole new crop of landowners to TransCanada's intrusions, or do we subject landowners on the Keystone I route to another year of the same distress they went through in 2009?

You know, we could avoid difficult questions like this altogether by simply denying TransCanada the permit for its harmful, unnecessary, and potentially defective pipeline. Senator Johanns isn't quite to that point: he says "it is in our national interest to obtain oil from allies" and that "appropriate use and construction of oil pipelines can directly meet this national interest." But if the State Department doesn't consider the Keystone I parallel route for Keystone XL, the Nebraska Republican may be ready to join the chorus saying a flat No to Keystone XL.
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Update 19:14 CDT: The State Department has given no indication of when it might approve the Keystone XL permit [James MacPherson and Josh Funk, "Canada-US pipeline on hold amid oil's recent woes," AP via Rapid City Journal, 2010.10.17].

More Landowners Organize to Stop TransCanada, Eminent Domain, and Tar Sands

Our friends at Plains Justice put up some useful information on the proposed TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline:

1. First, Plains Justice lists the chemical cocktail TransCanada wants to run under our farmland and across our aquifers. And TransCanada has the gall to say the risk is theirs, not the landowners'.
2. Plains Justice also links to a new online documentary from the Center for Energy Matters. The video shows Oklahomans and Texans who are disgusted by tar sands, eminent domain, shady business, and TransCanada's threat to clean water.
3. If you're on the Keystone XL route and TransCanada's land agents are trying to push you around, Plains Justice points to a website that may help. TransCanadaAbuse.com has set up a hotline to take reports on TransCanada's heavy-handed land-grab tactics and other abuses of landowner rights. Don't let TransCanada give you the shaft: call TransCanadaAbuse.com at 1-866-363-4648 and stand up to foreign oil!

Here's the Clean Energy Matters video:

TransCanada Brings Economic Benefits...

...for Consultants Who Say TransCanada Brings Economic Benefits

Yesterday I offered some counterpoint to the pro-pipeline corpspeak parroted by HeartlandCPD GM Mike McDowell. Mr. McDowell does offer a bagful of impressive numbers, including $470 million dollars in business activity and $685.6 million in property tax, all from the Keystone XL pipeline. McDowell says these figures (at least the former; I'm assuming the latter) come from an "independent study."

Hmm... I go looking around for $685.6 million... there it is! The figures cited appear to originate from this June 2010 economic impact analysis by the Perryman Group of Waco, Texas... an analysis paid for by TransCanada.

Now Mr. Perryman's math may still be correct, regardless of who paid him to do that math. But consider: Scott Heidepriem hires Steve Jarding for political consulting and analysis. Steve Jarding is smart, but if I wrote a blog post on Heidepriem and cited Jarding as an independent analyst, I'd be laughed off the porch.

By the way, Perryman's figures on business activity, tax revenues, and other goodies to come from Keystone XL are calculated over the lifetime of the pipeline, which is about 100 years. Citing the entire lifetime dollar figure makes the argument sound better—sort of the flip-side of how opponents of the new health care reform law like to shout about the trillion-dollar price tag, although that's over ten years, meaning we will spend much less to implement that law each year than we do to kill people and break things with our military budget. So to keep the direct, indirect, and dreamingly tangential economic impact of Keystone XL in a practical, annual perspective, be sure to divide TransCanada's rosy numbers by 100.

Keystone Pipeline Brings Few Jobs for South Dakotans

Plains Justice puts out important information about TransCanada's empty promises of economic gains from the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. The foreign oil company likes to tell us South Dakotans and others along the Keystone XL route that the pipeline will bring lots of well-paying construction jobs. Sure will... and TransCanada will bring lots of workers from other states to take those jobs and most of that money right back out of South Dakota.

Says who? TransCanada itself. In response to a Plains Justice inquiry, TransCanada provided this data on whom it hired to work on the Keystone I pipeline in eastern South Dakota through July 2009. Out of 2580 workers laying pipe in South Dakota, only 282—just under 11%—were permanent South Dakota residents. TransCanada breaks down the jobs in the following table:

Position	SD Residents	Non-SD Residents	Total Jobs
Supervision (Superintendents, foremen, office manager, clerical, etc.)	20	281	301
Welders, Welder Helpers, Pipe Fitters, etc.	3	395	398
Truck Drivers	32	241	273
Equipment Operators	27	542	569
Laborers	110	691	801
Construction Management, Surveyors, Inspectors, etc.	90	148	238
Total	282	2298	2580

The biggest categories for South Dakotans was the least skilled, general laborers, and even in that category, TransCanada only bothered to fill 13% of its need with our people. The only category in which we came out with a majority of the jobs were in management, surveying, and inspection. We missed out on most of the big money to be had in skilled work like equipment operation and welding (only three welders in all of South Dakota got work from TransCanada? Come on, TransCanada, share the wealth!).

Now let's check: Keystone I crosses 10 South Dakota counties: Marshall, Day, Clark, Beadle, Kingsbury, Miner, Hanson, McCook, Hutchinson, and Yankton. South Dakota Department of Labor numbers tell me that in July 2009, those ten counties had 1870 unemployed people. I'm thinking at least 800 of them would have been fit to operate a shovel. Out of the remaining 1000... well, take any 1000 South Dakotans at random, and I'll bet you can find more than 32 who can drive a truck, and more than 27 who can drive a skidsteer.

When I visited the Keystone I construction site in Miner County last year, I found Michels Pipeline Construction of Brownsville, Wisconsin, in charge. I have no reason to suspect these pipeliners weren't decent men doing good work to earn a living. But having a few more South Dakotans working on a big oil pipeline running through our state would do more than circulate more money in our economy. It would bring a little more comfort knowing that more of the workers building this environmentally hazardous project will be sticking around to live with the consequences of their handiwork.

Now building a pipeline does create temporary jobs. 282 jobs is certainly better than none. But the jobs data on Keystone I makes clear that TransCanada does not transmit the bulk of the benefits of pipeline construction to the South Dakota labor force.

Breaking Good News: Lower Niobrara Natural Resource District Opposes Keystone XL

Friends south of the border let me know that the Lower Niobrara Natural Resource District has passed a resolution opposing the construction of the TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline through their district in northern Nebraska. The resolution received unanimous approval at last night's meeting. No one spoke up with any plus side to running a tar sands pipeline right over the Ogallala Aquifer. Residents don't even see the pipeline adding any tax revenue to their coffers: they expect that if the pipeline is built, state officials will reduce aid to counties by exactly the amount counties see their local revenues increased by the pipeline.

According to my correspondent, the Lower Niobrara Natural Resource District has already helped some landowners get some changes in the pipeline route. If the District can put up serious resistance to the project as a whole, we may see some significant route changes. Of course, the better outcome would be for other landowners and citizens to recognize that they can align with groups like LNNRD to tell TransCanada we don't need their dirty foreign oil sustaining our fossil fuel addiction and spoiling our water and land. Keep up the fight, Nebraska! We're with you!

West River More Accepting of Keystone XL Pipeline

As that Sioux Falls paper revisits South Dakota's East-West divide, Public Utilities Commissioner Gary Hanson says TransCanada had an easier time getting West River landowners to submit to easements for the Keystone XL pipeline that the company had in East River along its Keystone route:

"East River, there were far more challenges regarding acquisitions of easements. That went much more smoothly West River," Hanson says. "West River, there was a pragmatic discussion and concerned questions, not the generally excitable atmosphere we had East River" [Peter Harriman, "East-West River: The Great Divide," that Sioux Falls paper, 2010.08.22].

Hmph. West River landowners must be more inclined to swallow the corporate line that oil leaks are just a normal part of business.

Speaking of which:

A small break in a BP pipeline that has leaked at least 1,700 gallons of petroleum into sewers in the northwestern Indiana city of Hammond could take days or weeks to pinpoint and fix, officials said Wednesday.

"We're at the point now where BP is literally trying to locate what could be a pinhole-sized leak," Hammond Mayor Tom McDermott said [Tom Coyne, "Officials: BP Fuel Leak Could Last Days, Weeks," AP via Bloomberg BusinessWeek, 2010.08.19].

Sure, 1700 gallons is a small spill... until it happens on your land, or pollutes your well. And that's from a pinhole flaw. How much oil will spill out of a similar defect in a Keystone pipeline pumping hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil under high pressure each day? And West River landowners are o.k. with this?

Actually, it might make sense that TransCanada could snap up pipeline easements more easily in West River. Here in East River, the Keystone pipeline runs under cropland where owners run lots of heavy plows and combines that I might be nervous about dragging across a thin metal tube filled with toxic combustible material. Out in West River, the heaviest thing a rancher might run across the pipeline is his pickup or a really big bull.

TransCanada Threatens Nebraskans with Eminent Domain Before Keystone XL Approval

TransCanada is swinging the eminent domain hammer on Nebraska landowners. Jane Kleeb at BoldNebraska reports that her neighbors along the proposed Keystone XL pipeline route have started receiving letters from the Canadian tar sands oil company threatening to condemn their land if they don't sign contracts with TransCanada within a month. Pretty ballsy, considering TransCanada hasn't even received permission from the federal government to build the pipeline.

Unlike South Dakota, where our Congressional delegation and other elected leaders have mostly rolled over for Big Oil, Nebraska's Republican Senator Mike Johanns has called TransCanada out on its Don Corleone tactics:

Landowners tell me that TransCanada has set arbitrary deadlines for acceptance of payment offers and threatened the use of eminent domain without so much as an approved permit to move forward with the project. In my letter, I ask TransCanada to immediately lift any deadlines imposed on Nebraska landowners and to negotiate in good faith [Senator Mike Johanns, press release, 2010.08.11].

It's about time I hear a Republican take his party's platform seriously and speak out against a foreign company using eminent domain to seize American citizens' property for its own profit.

TransCanada, of course, continues the corporate doublespeak:

TransCanada's commitment, number one, is to treat landowners with respect... and, number two, to work with landowners and come to a mutually acceptable agreement on easements whenever we can [Jeff Rauh, TransCanada spokesman, quoted in Art Hovey, "Keystone XL Letters Cause Stir," Lincoln Journal-Star, 2010.08.14].

Treat landowners with respect... I guess that means TransCanada will call you Mister when they use the courts to steal your land.

Union Prez: Keystone XL Could Cost Canada 36,000 Jobs

Americans opposed to TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline have some allies in Canada. No, not just the usual cast of fellow hippies and duck-lovers: Canadian workers realize that shipping tar sands oil south will also send good Canadian jobs to Texas:

Rammed through despite serious opposition, the first Keystone, built by TransCanada Corp., cost Canada thousands of jobs. An analysis by the Informetrica think-tank demonstrated that besides exporting 400,000 barrels of heavy crude a day, it also shipped out 18,000 high-paying Canadian jobs. Twice the size of TransCanada’s first Keystone is the new project, Keystone XL. It will shoot out 900,000 barrels of heavy crude in a one-way ride to the U.S. The number of jobs lost is expected to be more than double the 18,000 already gone.

These pipelines are sending our raw, unprocessed bitumen from Canadian tarsands to spanking new oil refineries in the U.S. It is the equivalent of shipping millions of raw logs for others to cut the two-by-fours and create the wood furniture. Like forestry, the best jobs are in processing. We are left with the tarsands’ massive mess. The Americans get the good jobs [David Coles, president of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union, "Pipeline Would Ship Oil and Jobs South," Toronto Star, 2010.08.08].

This Canadian labor position is no different from the position expressed by South Dakota politicians on value-added agriculture: basing your economy on the export of raw materials won't produce nearly as many jobs as developing your own capacity to process those raw materials into finished goods.

If the Keystone pipeline system is all about our great friendship with Canada, then do we really want to deny the Canadians 36,000 while leaving them with the environmental costs of the dirtiest oil in the world?
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Bonus TransCanada notes:

1. Keystone spokesman Robert Jones admits that TransCanada's withdrawal of its safety waiver request is mostly public relations: "We're trying to be responsive." Gee, how about being responsive to landowners' requests that you keep your darn pipeline off their land?
2. In the same article, Jones also hints that I'm dead-on in assuming the waiver request withdrawal is motivated by economic realities of lower demand, not any concern for the environment: "If we ever needed to get to the ultimate capacity, that would depend on market conditions.... I don't see that happening in the foreseeable future." TransCanada will still build the pipe with thinner steel, and they'll keep that safety waiver request in their files, but the market doesn't have enough demand to justify the P.R. battle in the current unfavorable political climate.
3. Montana has granted TransCanada condemnation powers to build Keystone XL. That means Canadians can take your land and your government won't stop them, just as happened here in South Dakota on the Keystone pipeline. Small consolation: Montana reversed an earlier denial of condemnation authority to TransCanada on the condition that TransCanada actually fulfill the "common carrier" definition and allow local oil producers to hook in and transport their product on the pipeline as well. If we can't stop Keystone XL, South Dakota should at the very least make the same demand for a true common carrier... or maybe a nice bike trail over the pipeline route!
   

TransCanada Safety Waiver Request Withdrawal Diversionary Tactic

Rule #1: Never trust TransCanada. Yesterday I celebrated TransCanada's withdrawal of its safety waiver request. But even as I typed that entry, I thought, "What's the catch?"

Here's the catch: TransCanada isn't giving up its corner-cutting, profit-milking, aquifer-endangering plan to skirt American safety regulations and pump more oil than they ought through the Keystone XL pipeline. They're just trying to distract us.

In its safety waiver request, TransCanada was asking permission to build Keystone XL with thinner-than-usual steel and to be able to pump oil through it at 80% of the maximum load pressure specified. Safety regs limit pumping pressure to 72% of maximum. TransCanada is now saying they'll accept the pumping pressure limit of 72%. But TransCanada still plans to build the pipeline with the thinner steel (lots likely from defective steel supplier Welspun) they've been proposing all along. Then, when all the negative press about BP's Gulf spill and Enbridge's Michigan spill and TransCanada's own Keystone leaks right here in South Dakota has subsided, they'll come back to the feds and file the same old safety request to get permission to turn the pressure up to 80%, just as they planned.

Am I just being paranoid or ungenerous toward TransCanada? No. Their own press release makes clear that they intend to do just that. I'll highlight the corporate Newspeak and trick phrases below. But don't be fooled: TransCanada plans to run Keystone XL with thinner steel and unsafe pressures. They plan to put the Ogallala aquifer and our High Plains ecosystems at greater risk of oil spills.

Special Permit Application Withdrawn for Keystone Gulf Coast Expansion Pipeline

Calgary, Alberta - August 5, 2010 - TransCanada has withdrawn its request to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) for a special permit. The permit would have allowed TransCanada to build the proposed Keystone XL pipeline using stronger steel with additional safety conditions and operate the pipeline at a slightly higher pressure than current federal regulations for oil pipelines in the United States.

After listening to concerns from the public and various political leaders, TransCanada made the decision to withdraw the permit application. The company will build Keystone XL using the as-proposed stronger steel [read: thinner steel] and operate it at a lower level of pressure, consistent with current U.S. regulations.

The company recognizes it needs to take more steps to assure the public and stakeholders the parameters of the special permit would result in a safer pipeline [i.e., we have a marketing problem, not an engineering or environmental problem]. The company will continue to establish an operating record which will demonstrate the strength and integrity of the Keystone Pipeline System [translation: we need to keep the Madville Times from getting any more DENR reports], which has been granted a special permit.

Keystone XL will implement the additional safety measures that would have been required under the special permit. These measures offer an enhanced level of safety and would allow TransCanada to request a special permit in the future [i.e., they think they can wait the bad press out]. These safety measures also will be consistent with those that have been implemented on the existing Keystone Pipeline. In issuing the special permit for Keystone, PHMSA concluded the permit would provide a level of safety equal to or greater than that provided if the pipeline were operated under the current standard.

Without the special permit, Keystone XL will meet all of its initial commercial commitments to serve Gulf Coast refineries. Keystone also will continue to work with U.S. producers in the Bakken and broader Williston Basin area to provide needed transport for growing production in Montana and the Dakotas.

The Keystone XL project received approval in March 2010 from both the South Dakota Public Utility Commission and the National Energy Board in Canada. Pending receipt of additional permits, construction is planned to begin in 2011.

When completed, the Keystone XL project will increase the commercial capacity of the overall Keystone Pipeline System from 590,000 barrels per day to approximately 1.1 million barrels per day. The $12 billion system is 83 percent subscribed with long-term, binding contracts that include commitments of 910,000 barrels per day for an average term of approximately 18 years.

Commercial operations of the first phase of the Keystone system began June 30. Construction of the extension from Steele City Nebraska to Cushing Oklahoma is one-third complete and the pipeline is expected to be operational in 2011.

Keystone XL is a planned 1,959-mile (3,134-kilometre), 36-inch crude oil pipeline stretching from Hardisty, Alberta and moving southeast through Saskatchewan, Montana, South Dakota and Nebraska. It will connect with a portion of the Keystone Pipeline that will be built through Kansas to Cushing, Oklahoma and facilitate take away capacity from U.S. hubs located on the pipeline. The pipeline will then continue on through Oklahoma to a delivery point near existing terminals in Nederland, Texas to serve the Port Arthur, Texas marketplace.

To view a map of the proposed pipeline route, please visit the project web page at www.transcanada.com/keystone

With more than 50 years' experience [though not in high-pressure oil pipelines], TransCanada is a leader in the responsible development and reliable operation of North American energy infrastructure including natural gas and oil pipelines, power generation and gas storage facilities. TransCanada's network of wholly owned natural gas pipelines extends more than 60,000 kilometres (37,000 miles), tapping into virtually all major gas supply basins in North America. TransCanada is one of the continent's largest providers of gas storage and related services with approximately 380 billion cubic feet of storage capacity. A growing independent power producer, TransCanada owns, or has interests in, over 11,700 megawatts of power generation in Canada and the United States. TransCanada is developing one of North America's largest oil delivery systems. TransCanada's common shares trade on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges under the symbol TRP. For more information visit:
www.transcanada.com

Paul Elliott
Government Relations
TransCanada Corporation
Telephone: (646) 823-7026
Cell: (917) 828-3983

NRDC agrees with me that this is all a P.R. ploy, pure diversionary baloney. Here's what TransCanada is really saying: The oil industry is getting bad press now. Plus, the market fundamentals aren't shaping up the way we'd hoped. We probably won't have as much oil demand to meet during the first year or two of the pipeline's operation anyway. We don't need to pump as much oil through it when we start up. Our profits will be fine, the bad press will subside, and then, after those American Tea Partiers throw Obama out in 2012, we can ask the Palin Administration to sign our safety waiver... and give us another half-billion-dollar subsidy.

Keystone XL is still a threat to our water, our very livelihood on the plains. We don't want it, and we don't need it. State Department, just say no.
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Distantly related: The Big Sioux River from Sioux Falls south is currently a biohazard... because extreme pressure and corrosive contents make sewer pipes burst.

TransCanada Gives in, Withdraws Safety Waiver Request!

Yeah, that's worth an exclamation point—UPDATE 2010.08.06: oh, wait, probably not.

TransCanada has withdrawn its request for a safety waiver from the U.S. Department of Transportation for construction of its Keystone XL pipeline. Senator Jon Tester of Montana announced today that that TransCanada says it will back off its request to operate the pipeline at higher pressure than normal for the thickness of steel proposed. That move alone could cost TransCanada as much as $1 billion. Sen. Tester says "TransCanada also agreed to bury the pipeline at a depth of four feet, conduct frequent inspections and treat the pipeline with an anti-corrosive coating."

Every one of these steps decreases the chance of oil spills like the ones we've already seen on TransCanada's new Keystone pipeline. Keystone XL still represents a significant threat to our wetlands and aquifers. But if we can't convince the government that Keystone XL is an unnecessary extension of our addiction to ever dirtier oil, we can at least take pleasure in this significant victory for environmental safety.

Gulf Oil Spill Dissipating; Pipeline Spews in Michigan

Let's start with the good news: BP's giant oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico is disappearing faster than anyone expected. As in War of the Worlds, we can thank the tiniest members of the ecosystem, bacteria, for getting rid of a big part of the problem. In an interesting evolutionary note, the Gulf of Mexico has lots of natural oil seepage, so natural selection has favored microbes that can eat the stuff. Also helping: evaporation (oil evaporates? who'd've thought?) and the biggest oil spill response ever, 4000+ ships, thanks to BP and Uncle Sam.

Of course, this is just the view from the surface. Fishermen worry that much of the oil is down below, settling to the sea floor where they get shrimp and oysters. One researcher can still find oil in the coral at the site of a 1979 oil spill off the Yucatan Peninsula. Fisheries recovered from that spill after two years, although oyster beds appear to have been permanently degraded.

Now the bad news, especially for those of your being forced to become neighbors with TransCanada's Keystone tar sands pipeline: an Enbridge Energy pipeline sprang a leak Sunday near Marshall, Michigan, and spewed 840,000 gallons (about 20,000 barrels) of oil into a creek that runs into the Kalamazoo River. Local officials worry that the size of this spill makes contamination of the local water supply inevitable.

Enbridge, TransCanada's Calgary-based competitor, at least won't have any trouble paying for the cleanup: they just reported record earnings for the second quarter of 2010.

When it's working, that Enbridge pipeline carries about 190,000 barrels of oil per day from Indiana to Ontario. 20,000 barrels represents about two and a half hours worth of pipeline capacity... meaning the leak ran for at least two and a half hours before someone noticed and put a cork in it. The first word authorities got of the leak came not from Enbridge but from a citizen calling 911 around 9 p.m. Sunday after noticing the stink of oil in his neighborhood.

A note to neighbors on TransCanada's Keystone pipeline route: that new pipe pumps 435,000 barrels a day across our prairie wetlands and water supplies. TransCanada's proposed but increasingly embattled Keystone XL expansion would haul another 900,000 barrels a day across West River and other nice places. If either of those pipes blows a gasket, imagine how long it will take for a farmer or rancher or other passerby to notice the oil and fumes out in the middle of a slough, and then for TransCanada to dispatch a response team from Fargo or Yankton.

But don't worry: in the State Department's draft environmental impact statement, TransCanada's people calculate that Keystone XL will only have one spill incident every 7400 years (see page 14). Of course that's per mile of pipeline. Feel free to divide by 1700 miles of pipeline and roll the dice on your aquifer.

Congress Wimps out on Energy Policy: Time to Conserve!

Heartland Consumer Power District exec Mike McDowell is surely thrilled that obstructionist Republicans like Senator Thune and wimpy Democrats like Representative Herseth Sandlin have killed serious clean energy legislation for now. Instead of imperiling our economy with "heavy-handed expensive government mandates" (i.e., plans like cap and trade, which are empirically proven to reduce pollution and not kill the economy), we can trundle along with a status quo that supports the polluting, irresponsible energy economy that will leave our grandkids nothing to burn but resentment.

But wait: McDowell does have a plan I can work with:

Part of our LEED Platinum commitment is sustainability. This means smarter use and reuse of common consumer products. The positive impact on the environment as well as reducing oil consumption is startling. It can be done with simple changes in behavior, using existing technologies at affordable prices. It can be done without heavy-handed expensive government mandates and without waiting for some silver bullet technology to be developed to make it work [Mike McDowell, "Consumers Can Take LEEDing Steps to Reduce Oil Use," HCPDBlog.com, 2010.07.21].

McDowell and I agree on the power of conservation, and if our Congress can't overcome the Big Oil and Coal lobbies, then conservation is perhaps the best grassroots pocketbook policy we can do. McDowell and I agree that recycling is great. We agree that replacing plastic bags with canvas sacks and backpacks at the grocery store is a great way to reduce oil consumption.

McDowell also points out the remarkable savings to be gained from recycling motor oil:

• It is easier and cheaper to recycle used oil than to make new oil from crude. One gallon of used oil can produce the same amount of motor oil as 42 gallons of crude oil while requiring about a third of the energy.
• If all used motor oil in the U.S. were recycled, it would result in a saving of 1.3 million barrels of oil per day.
• Used oil can be re-refined into good-as-new lubricating oil. Oil never wears out it just gets dirty [McDowell, 2010.07.21].

1.3 million barrels a day. That's more oil than both the Keystone and Keystone XL pipelines will transport at full capacity. One change in our energy practices, recycling our motor oil, could eliminate the need for a massive, environmentally dangerous project and reduce our dependence on dirty foreign oil.

If we can't motivate Congress to change our energy policy, then we'll have to do it ourselves. let's all be conservatives and conserve, conserve, conserve!

EPA: Send Keystone Environmental Impact Study Back to Drawing Board

TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline faces some serious problems. House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) has declared the pipeline "would be a step in the wrong direction, undermining the President’s efforts to move America to a clean energy economy." The folks who plan to make the steel for Keystone XL produced all sorts of defective steel for other pipelines between 2007 and 2009.

And now the Environmental Protection Agency has said the State Department's draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for Keystone XL is inadequate.

"Inadequate"—that's govspeak for "It sucks." EPA only has three categories for rating the adequacy of DEIS's: "inadequate" is the lowest rating possible. To provoke one government agency to so directly contradict another, the State Department must really have failed to do its homework on Keystone XL.

The opening statement from EPA's letter to State:

[W]e think that the Draft EIS does not provide the scope or detail of analysis to fully inform decision makers and the public, and recommend that additional information and analysis be provided. The topics on which we believe additional information and analysis are necessary include the purpose and need for the project, potential greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with the project, air pollutant emissions at the receiving refineries, pipeline safety/spill response, potential impacts to environmental justice communities, wetlands and migratory birds [Environmental Protection Agency, letter to State Department, 2010.07.16].

Pipeline spills— like the 3300-gallon spill that contaminated Belle Creek in southeastern Montana last November and cost Texas-based Encore Operating a $93K fine. EPA notes that TransCanada won't tell us what mystery chemicals it plans to mix with the tar sands oil to make it flow through the pipeline, sicne the mix of "cutter stock" is declared "proprietary." Keeping that information secret makes it difficult to calculate the full impact of spills on the environment and to plan proper safety and clean-up responses when (not if) a spill happens.

EPA says the State Department takes far too narrow a view of the impact of Keystone XL on the environment and our long-term energy security:

Alongside the national security benefits of importing crude oil from a stable trading partner, we believe the national security implications of expanding the Nation's long-term commitment to a relatively high carbon source of oil should also be considered [EPA, 2010].

On greenhouse gases, EPA says State only calculates the impact of construction and operation of the pipeline and refining on our end. EPA suggests State include the emissions at the Canadian end as well. EPA estimates that converting tar sands into pipable oil will emit 27 million metric tons of CO2 above the emissions of normal crude oil production. Says EPA, that's equivalent to firing up seven new coal-fired power plants.

Dang—that's what I've been saying!

Review the full list of EPA recommendations for bringing the DEIS up to snuff, and you'll see that EPA is not saying that Uncle Sam should shut down Keystone XL. But EPA is saying that if we are going to permit Keystone XL, we need a lot more rigorous science to understand, plan for, and mitigate its drastic impact on our environment and our energy security.

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Related: In a press release, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Scott Heidepriem connects the EPA's letter and the curent administration's "coddling" of TransCanada. Heidepriem notes that he supported but Lt. Gov. Dennis Daugaard and his boss opposed a two-cent-per-barrel tax on pipeline oil to cover the cost of spill clean-up and a cancellation of millions of dollars tax refunds for the Keystone pipeline projects.

Also:

1. TransCanada doesn't think Keystone XL needs any more studies.
2. Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach spent $55,800 earlier this month to buy a Washington Post ad defending the project from Congressional criticism. I wonder how much of the public coffers he'll spend lobbying the EPA on behalf of Big Oil.
3. The Sierra Club "applaud[s] EPA's scrutiny" and calls EPA's ruling a "game changer."
4. Some nice people in Nebraska are applauding as well.
   

Celebrate Canada Day: Stop Keystone XL

Happy ! Happy Canada Day!

We Marxists can't wait to create the North American Union, since it would achieve our ultimate goal of merging our national holidays into a huge midsummer four-day holiday. But contrary to the fears of some black-helicopter alarmists, we treasonous continentalizers do not want to unite Canada and the U.S. with more tar sands pipelines. In fact, on this Canada Day, we honor our northern neighbors [and someday compatriots!] by calling on the United States to block construction of Keystone XL, a tar sands pipeline that will only feed our fossil fuel addiction at the expense of Canada's environment (hat tip to Robert Pore):

Production of tar sand oils is already the largest contributor of greenhouse gases in Canada, and production is only slated to expand. The mining and processing of tar sands also produces land damage, heavy water use and pollution.

The world’s largest tar sand deposit, in Alberta, covers 54,000 square miles, an area the size of England. Strip mining is used extensively, leaving very large holes.

Another mining method — injecting steam and solvents such as caustic soda into shafts — uses up to four units of water for every unit of oil produced. And after being used, the water is mostly held in tailing ponds and is unfit for human or animal use [environmental historian Francis Moul, "TransCanada Pipeline Threatens the Sand Hills," guest editorial, Omaha World Herald, 2010.06.25].

Trusted White House advisor John Podesta has called tar sands oil "polluting, destructive, expensive, and energy intensive" resource that cannot be made environmentally safe. Tar sands only make Canada messier... and they won't do much for the U.S., either.

Celebrate Canada Day by doing our neighbors a favor: stop TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline.

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p.s.: Or at the very least, if we can't stop Keystone XL, send out some inspectors to make sure TransCanada doesn't build with defective Indian steel.