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Post 15 Nov 2011, 9:09 am

In Mr. Obama's never-ending quest to cripple the American economy, he votes "present" on energy security and jobs in one breathtaking act of failing to act:

Canada—not Saudi Arabia or Iraq—is the single-largest provider of America’s imported crude oil and refined oil products. In 2010, it supplied nearly 27 percent of net U.S. petroleum imports and 21.4 percent of all U.S. crude oil purchases abroad, more than the entire Persian Gulf region (18.4 percent), and far more than second place Mexico (12.5 percent) and third place Venezuela (9.9 percent). (By the way, remember those claims that the United States invaded Iraq for its oil? Well, in 2010 Iraq accounted for a mere 4.5 percent of U.S. crude oil imports and only about a quarter of its crude exports went to the United States, less than went to China!) In 2010, the United States imported about 46 percent of its total crude oil consumption (and 49 percent of all petroleum products) and hence Canada supplied about 8 percent of America’s crude oil, almost every twelfth barrel.

The existing Keystone pipeline carries crude oil from the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta to Illinois (since June 2010) and to Oklahoma (since February 2011) and its capacity is about 30 percent of Canada’s total crude oil exports to the United States (or almost 600,000 barrels a day). Its extension, Keystone XL, has been under consideration since 2009 and it received the approval of Canada’s National Energy Board in March 2010. It would transport oil from Alberta by crossing first to Montana and then to Nebraska, where it would connect to the existing Keystone line to Oklahoma and a further extension would then reach the Gulf Coast refineries in Texas. The XL line would have a capacity of 700,000 barrels a day and hence the entire Keystone system would move 1.3 million barrels a day, equal to about 13 percent of the country’s total imports of petroleum products and just over 6 percent of its total crude oil consumption in 2010.

Construction of the pipeline has been opposed on a variety of environmental grounds. The planned XL route was to cross assorted “sensitive” areas; a catastrophic rupture would contaminate Ogallala, the country’s largest aquifer; and, most notably, the pipeline would move “dirty” crude derived from Alberta’s oil sands, whose extraction and upgrading uses considerably more energy, and hence emits more carbon dioxide than, the production of conventional liquid oil. As a result, protests against the XL pipeline have been portrayed as protecting a planet in peril and helping to avert catastrophic climate change.

Here are a few facts to consider. With a total length of close to 3,000 kilometers, the new pipeline would add just over 1 percent to the already existing network of crude oil and refined products lines that crisscross the United States and parts of Canada. Why, if pipeline safety is a key concern, have we not seen waves of civil disobedience focused on more than a quarter million kilometers of existing pipelines?

Long-term statistics show convincingly that there is no safer way to transport large masses of liquids over long distances than a pipeline. Moving the same amount by trucks or rail would be much more risky, in addition to being vastly more expensive. So would be moving the oil from Alberta to British Columbia and then shipping it by tankers via the Panama Canal to Texas.

Are the protesters concerned about fragile landscapes and potential water pollution? A pipeline can be re-routed in order to avoid running through areas seen as fragile and its sections crossing the areas underlain by Ogallala could be designed with even greater safety precautions than the usual standard in order to limit any spill to a small, localized area. All of these are engineering challenges with acceptable practical solutions. Inevitably, no matter how it would be done, there will always be a residual risk: so it will always be with oil imports by supertankers or (as we hear from the opponents of the practice) with horizontal drilling and fracking needed to produce more natural gas.

The pipeline’s contribution to global climate change is presented as the key reason for blocking its construction. Comparison of carbon dioxide emissions from burning products (gasoline, kerosene, diesel fuel) distilled from different kinds of crude oils should be done on a comprehensive, well-to-wheel basis: values for extraction, processing, and transportation may differ substantially, but the values for combustion of refined liquid fuels are virtually identical and they account for an overwhelming majority (roughly two-thirds) of emissions. On this basis carbon dioxide emissions from fuels derived from Alberta oil sands are about 5 percent higher than for an average barrel consumed in the United States.

Even if we assume that the emissions mean for fuel produced from oil sands is 15 percent higher than the prevailing U.S. average (which would be the case if all that oil was produced by steam stimulation, the most CO2-intensive way of extracting oil from sands) this would translate roughly to an additional 70 kilograms of CO2 per barrel of fuel. With the XL’s annual throughput of about 250 million barrels, this would produce additional CO2 emissions of about 18 million tons per year. For comparison, in 2010 alone China’s total CO2 emissions rose by 780 million tons—more than 40 times the additional CO2 that would be emitted annually from the extraction, transportation, processing, and combustion of Alberta oil carried through the Keystone XL to Texas. Put another way, if there would be no oil-sand oil produced in Alberta to feed the XL pipeline and then refined in the United States and the products burned in American vehicles, then the Chinese would generate an additional mass of CO2 equivalent to that prevented burden in less than two weeks.

Here comes the craziest twist: if the opponents of the XL succeed and prevent its construction, there is a strong possibility that Alberta’s oil sand-derived oil will be piped westward to Canada’s Pacific coast and loaded on supertankers going to Asia, to feed China’s grossly inefficient industries.

And there is more. The XL is to deliver an equivalent of about 6 percent of total U.S. crude oil consumption in 2010, a small share that the country should be able to do without. Indeed, it could have done that already in the past if it had steadily improved the performance of its vehicles rather than keeping it flat for two decades between 1986 and 2006.

The new pipeline would add just over 1 percent to the already existing network of crude oil and refined products lines that crisscross the United States and parts of Canada.

Either way, the United States will need oil imports for a long time to come, as even the fastest conceivable transition to non-fossil energies cannot be accomplished in a matter of one or two decades. If the United States chooses to cut itself off from its largest, most reliable, and most durable supply of crude oil, from where will it, with its continuing high use of transportation fuel, get its future imports? Crude oil production in two other major U.S. suppliers in the Western hemisphere, Mexico and Venezuela, has been declining (by, respectively, more than 20 percent and more than 15 percent between 2005 and 2011), and in the Middle East the United States faces enormous competition from China.

By preventing the oil flow from Canada, the United States will thus deliberately deprive itself of new manufacturing and construction jobs; it will not slow down the increase of global CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion (OK, by two weeks, perhaps); it will almost certainly empower China; and it will make itself strategically even more vulnerable by becoming further dependent on declining, unstable, and contested overseas crude oil supplies. That is what is called a spherically perfect decision, because no matter from which angle you look at it, it looks perfectly the same: wrong.


Thousands of union jobs thrown away by the President. Tens of thousands of related jobs down the drain too.

We can't wait . . . until January 20, 2013!
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Post 18 Nov 2011, 1:42 pm

He's at it again: President Obama won't stop until all of our oil comes from countries that hate us. Besides, we don't need jobs! First it was the Gulf, then the Canadian pipeline, and now . . .

President Obama's United States Department of Agriculture has delayed shale gas drilling in Ohio for up to six months by cancelling a mineral lease auction for Wayne National Forest (WNF). The move was taken in deference to environmentalists, on the pretext of studying the effects of hydraulic fracturing.
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Post 18 Nov 2011, 5:53 pm

You do know that fracking has been linked to earthquakes in the UK?

Ach, who cares about earthquakes?
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Post 18 Nov 2011, 10:48 pm

DF the only reason for the hold up on Keystone XL is the massive administration corruption that was uncovered.
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Post 19 Nov 2011, 6:14 am

Neal Anderth wrote:DF the only reason for the hold up on Keystone XL is the massive administration corruption that was uncovered.


source?
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Post 20 Nov 2011, 1:22 am

Keystone is a Koch Industries project yes ? That possibly explains Obama's reluctance to do them any favours...

Fracking may be delayed right now, but ultimately it will have to go ahead. The amounts of gas available are just too significant to ignore. We're going to desperately need the energy. The 'earthquakes' that were tentatively linked with fracking in the UK were so weak as to be completely undetectable without the use of the most advanced sensor equipment. Far too weak to cause any damage. The bigger concern is potential contamination of the aquifers, although I think it should be possible to introduce safety measures to guard against this.
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Post 20 Nov 2011, 6:00 am

Fracking may be delayed right now, but ultimately it will have to go ahead. The amounts of gas available are just too significant to ignore. We're going to desperately need the energy.
As long as the risks and costs are accounted for, then fair enough.

The 'earthquakes' that were tentatively linked with fracking in the UK were so weak as to be completely undetectable without the use of the most advanced sensor equipment. Far too weak to cause any damage.
It's true that they were of low magnitude. The first one to cause concern was 2.3, the one that prompted a moratorium on drilling was 1.5. Apparently it would take a 2.6-3 to start to be a problem, and higher than that to cause risk to property and people. However, the 2.3 tremor was noticed by more than just 'the most advanced sensor equipment'. It was felt in the town by people.

But there have been dozens of earthquakes (not 'earthquakes') that have been linked to the Caudrilla operations in the Irish Sea. Not just 'tentatively', and not just by green-freaks, that was from a report commissioned by the company itself:

Exclusive: Fracking company - we caused 50 tremors in Blackpool – but we're not going to stop (Independent, 3 Nov 2011)

The bigger concern is potential contamination of the aquifers, although I think it should be possible to introduce safety measures to guard against this.
I'm not sure how this can be done that easily. In order to do so, you'd need to be very sure that there was no permeable rock between the frack-sites and aquifer waters, and that the act of fracking is not causing wider tiny faults in the rocks. I doubt we have the technology to properly detect that to a very high degree of confidence, let alone to stop it happening. But if we do, are will soon, that will be an additional cost and likely extra regulation that will be needed to ensure it happens. Which will introduce delays to the process of granting licenses.

Of course, some will not care about the risks of fracking if they can avoid having to bear them. Thus, emotional blackmail about 'jobs' in order to attack the President is more important to Party-line hacks than the full facts of the case...
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Post 20 Nov 2011, 1:13 pm

The bigger concern is potential contamination of the aquifers, although I think it should be possible to introduce safety measures to guard against this.

Possible . Maybe. Do we know enough about the new frakking techologies right now to understand the limitations and the problems that might be caused?
It probably makes very good sense to allow some projects, heaviliy monitored by independent scientific research teams, to learn some of this. But to put at risk the major source of water for large geographies and large populaces? Once pollutted...


Keystone is a Koch Industries project yes ?

No. Trans Canada Piplines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TransCanada_Corporation

And as I understand it, the major opposition is to the route through the Oklahoma aquifers. If Trans Canada can't settle this, they'll build a pipeline to the west Coast and commence selling to China. Me, I think the effect of the US pipeline is less problematic than oil tankers to China.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TransCanada_Corporation
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Post 29 Nov 2011, 8:43 am

As I understand it, the politicians in the state of Nebraska (Republican governor, Republican majority legislature) last week decided to move the pipeline. Presumably they put the interests of their state ahead of a desire for a quick start. The approval for a new route would depend on an environmental evaluation.

Landowners are also cmplaining about threats to confiscate land. There are a few dozen eminent domain suits in SD and Tx and landowners testified at the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

So it's not just greenies who object and it's not just Obama acting to delay approval.

Oh, and a report by Cornell's ILR Global Labor Institute published two months ago claims that while up to 4650 temporary jobs would be created by the construction, it could end up costing jobs due to a rise in fuel prices in the Midwest (10c or more).

A lot of the 'new' jobs are outside the US or for work that has already been done. The Kansas and Oklahoma sections exist now, the manufacture of the steel pipe itself has already been started in India (by Wellspun) and 40% will be made in Canada (by Evraz, a Russian company) and the report claims that TransCanada's figures overstate US job impacts.

When I get in frm work I'll post a link to the pdf
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Post 29 Nov 2011, 1:38 pm

Here it is: Report into Keystone XL job creation

I note that the approval at a national level has just been postponed, and was after TransCanada said there was no alternative route. As soon as the decision came out, an alternate route was proposed by TransCanada (Canadians that lie? Surely not!). Now that Nebraska has inserted an extra level of approval, it could take longer. Or, a decent compromise could be reached.

Still, there's no point debating the facts of the case. It's clearly all Obama's fault. He is controlling the Republican Governor of Nebraska and all of the state's legislature with mind-rays. He's put up loads of landowners to refrain from selling so that TransCanada has to launch eminent domain actions. He personally went up to Ithaca and wrote a paper to undermine the case for jobs. It wouldn't surprise me if he invented the Ogallala aquifer just so he could foil this amazingly great plan. :sigh:
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Post 29 Nov 2011, 2:41 pm

I'm disappointed that the pipeline isn't being built right now since there are real people who need real work; it is not an abstraction. However, I place great weight in the views of the Nebraska governor and legislature. I've only had a chance to skim it, but I'm not terribly impressed by the Cornell ILR report. It seems very ideological to me. (The Cornell ILR school is considered very leftist, by the way, as I've learned from a friend who is an alum.) It is interesting how the Keynesian multiplier is used or ignored depending on the situation and the ideology.
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Post 29 Nov 2011, 2:59 pm

Ray Jay wrote:I'm disappointed that the pipeline isn't being built right now since there are real people who need real work; it is not an abstraction. However, I place great weight in the views of the Nebraska governor and legislature.
It would likely cause a boost in jobs at least over the two years of construction, which is definitely needed. If it's private investment or public investment, capital scheme boost employment and that's what is needed as a stimulus.

But development should not trample over everything else, and clearly the people in the affected state and their representatives have concerns about the original route, and want to have a say in any alternative. That's democracy, I would say. I'm guessing that an aquifer in the Midwest is not something you want to blithely put at risk of pollution.

Having looked up the ILR and in particular the Labor Institute, I can see where you are coming from, with lots of links to the unions there. Still, the evidence about what has already been spent and how much of it was spent outside the USA does suggest that the claims about job creation need to be taken with a pinch of salt.
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Post 29 Nov 2011, 4:12 pm

In Canada there's a lot of criticism of Trans Canada over how they handled this...
an example:
Keystone has attracted an improbable coalition of opponents. It includes cattle ranchers, the Republican governor of Nebraska, Hollywood green celebs, libertarian private-property rights advocates anticipating a Keystone expropriation of grazing and other U.S. lands, and alternative energy proponents.
Obama is not the environmental president the U.S. eco-vote thought it was getting. Obama has always seen the continued use of fossil fuels as a necessary “bridge” to that point, two decades out, when wind, solar and other energy alternatives become practical.
And so Obama has conditionally approved Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s plans for oil fields off the coast of the politically-sensitive Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In September the president angered not just environmentalists but civic leaders by withdrawing a promised Environmental Protection Agency measure to more vigorously reduce smog. Obama even greenlighted the hated BP’s return to exploration activity in the Gulf of Mexico.
But with its maladroit handling of the Keystone proposal over the past five months, TransCanada managed to allow White House approval or rejection of Keystone to become a litmus test for a president facing uncertain re-election prospects next year, and needing to mend fences with the environmental portion of his political base. Shelving Keystone became almost a no-brainer at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

source
http://www.thestar.com/business/article ... -athabasca

And by the way, pipelines create very little in the way of permanent employment.
Note that many think that production costs of Oil Sands will soon start to get to where alternative sources are going to be very competitive. And at that point a long term investment in the pipeline might start to seem unwise to some investors. Still, without a larger delivery system the extraction can't be revved up. And until production costs do start to out strip alternative energy its got a life.
I think they'll probably go ahead with the new route confirmed by Christmas. Probably better than switching to a route through the Rockies for Chinese tankers...
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Post 07 Dec 2011, 8:48 am

Energy in the US


This paragraph aptly sums up why Obama and Company steadfastly refuse to use what we have and instead insist on "green" models that don't work:

Access to affordable, abundant energy is, fundamentally, a means of freedom. But for those seeking to create a crisis that provides an opportunity to direct the way we live, work and act, affordable, reliable, abundant, domestic energy is a threat. In a very real sense, the more energy we have, the less power they will have. Energy abundance ends the justification for central energy decision-making.


It's about power--political.
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Post 07 Dec 2011, 2:14 pm

Of course its all a conspiracy