KXL was AWOL from SOTU – along with real energy, job, economic and revenue solutions
Guest essay by Paul Driessen
President Obama frequently says he wants to turn the economy around, put America back to work, produce more energy, improve public safety, and open new markets to goods stamped “Made in the USA.” In his State of the Union address he said, if congressional inaction continues, “I will act on my own to slash bureaucracy and streamline the permitting process for key projects, so we can get more construction workers on the job as fast as possible.”
Unfortunately, like Arafat, he never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity to do all these things.
Most Americans are no longer fooled by empty hope and change hype. In December only 74,000 jobs were created (many of them low-paying part-time seasonal positions), while 374,000 more people gave up looking for work. Not surprisingly, recent polls have found that three-quarters of Americans say the country still appears to be in a recession, two-thirds don’t trust the President to make the right decisions for the country, and barely 30% say the nation is “heading in the right direction.”
The President needs to use his pen and phone to free our energy, economy and entrepreneurial instincts. But ANWR, OCS, HF, KXL and other solutions were AWOL from the SOTU. They were sacrificed on the CO2 and CMGW altar, by the POTUS, EPA, DOI and DOE, in obeisance to the EDF, NRDC, other environmentalist pressure groups, and assorted unelected, unaccountable, unconstitutional autocrats.
(Don’t you love Washington-speak – from the land of acronyms, that pricey patch of real estate on the banks of the Potomac River, bordered by reality and places where people actually work to earn a living, despite presidents and hordes of legislators and regulators doing their level best to make that difficult. For those whose Wash-speak is as bad as their Spanish and German, translations are provided below.)*
Our nation is blessed with vast energy, metallic, mineral, forest and other resources, waiting to be tapped. But they are locked up in favor of crony-capitalist, eco-unfriendly, land-hungry, subsidy-dependent, nigh-useless pseudo-alternatives that are dearly beloved by utopian environmentalists – and by politicians hungry for campaign contributions from businesses that they repay with billions in other people’s money, taken from taxpayers at the point of an IRS gun to prop up renewable energy schemes.
Our hydrocarbon wealth especially offers amazing benefits: improved human safety, health, welfare and living standards, in a more stable world, with new sources of jobs, wealth and income equality. Not tapping these resources is contrary to Obama’s promises and our national interest. It is immoral.
Of all the opportunities arrayed before him, the 1,179-mile Alberta to Texas Keystone XL pipeline (KXL) is the most “shovel ready.” Indeed, it awaits merely a presidential phone call or signature, to slash bureaucratic red tape, streamline the permitting process, and create construction and manufacturing jobs. Some 40,000 jobs in fact – more than half as many as were created nationwide last December.
As I have pointed out before (here, here, here and here), there are compelling reasons why the President should end this interminable six-years-and-counting dilatory KXL review process – right now.
Jobs. KXL would create an estimated 20,000 construction jobs; another 10,000 in factories that make the steel, pipelines, valves, cement and equipment needed to build the pipeline; thousands more in hotel, restaurant and other support industries; and still more jobs in the Canadian, North Dakota and other oil fields whose output would be transported by the pipeline to refineries and petrochemical plants where still more workers would be employed. With Mr. Obama and his EPA waging war on communities and states that mine and use coal, these jobs are even more important to blue-collar workers in Middle America.
Revenue. States along the pipeline route would receive $5 billion in new property tax revenues, and still more in workers’ income tax payments. Federal coffers would also realize hefty gains.
Safety. Right now most of the oil from Canada’s oil sands and North Dakota’s Bakken shale deposits moves by railroad and truck fuel tanks, often through populated areas. Truck and rail accidents have forced towns to evacuate and even killed 50 people in Lac-Megantic, Quebec. Corporate executives and federal regulators are working to improve tanker designs and reroute traffic. But even despite occasional accidents, pipelines have a much better safety record. KXL would be built with state-of-the-art pipe, valves and other components, to the latest design, manufacturing, construction and inspection specifications. It has been configured to avoid population centers, sensitive wildlife areas and the Ogallala Aquifer.
Resource conservation and energy needs. Building Keystone will help ensure that vast petroleum resources can be efficiently utilized to meet consumer needs. In conjunction with other pipelines, it will greatly reduce the need to flare (burn and waste) natural gas that is a byproduct of oil production in Bakken shale country. The pipelines will also help get propane and natural gas to places that need these fuels. Recent pipeline problems, plus unusually high demands for propane to convert corn to ethanol, created soaring prices and shortages amid one of the nastiest North American cold spells in decades.
KXL will also enable state and private lands to continue contributing to America’s hydrocarbon renaissance. That is especially important in the face of congressional and Obama Administration refusals to open more federal onshore and offshore oil and gas prospects in Alaska and the Lower 48 States.
US-Canadian relations. The endless dithering over KXL has frayed relations between Canada and the United States. It has compelled the Canadians to take decisive steps toward building new pipelines from the Alberta oil sands fields to Superior, Wisconsin … and to Canada’s west coast, for shipment to Asia’s growing economies. Further delays will not reduce oil sands development – only the oil’s destination.
Climate change. In his SOTU speech, President Obama informed us that “climate change is a fact.” Well, duh. It’s been a fact since Earth was formed. The only pertinent issues are these: Are humans causing imminent, unprecedented climate change disasters? And can we control Earth’s climate, by drastically curtailing hydrocarbon use, slashing living standards and switching to renewables?
No evidence supports either proposition. Moreover, oil sands production would add a minuscule 0.06% to US greenhouse gas emissions, a tiny fraction of that amount to global carbon dioxide emissions, and an undetectable 0.00002 deg F (0.00001 C) per year to useless computer-model scenarios for global warming.
A January 24 letter spearheaded by Senator John Hoeven (R-ND) and signed by all 45 Republican Senators notes many of these points and requests that President Obama permit KXL pipeline construction “as soon as possible.” Several Democrats told Hoeven privately that they support his effort and Keystone, but are nervous about challenging the President or Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid publicly.
On January 31, the State Department reaffirmed its previous conclusions that KXL is unlikely to noticeably increase demand for Canadian oil sands or global emissions of carbon dioxide. With reelection behind him, the President has “greater flexibility” and doesn’t need to kowtow to his radical green base. By picking up his pen and phone, cutting off another year-long study of whether Keystone is “in the national interest,” and approving the pipeline, he could satisfy independents and his union base. He’d even reduce CO2 emissions, which State says would be 28-42% higher if Canada’s oil is shipped via train or truck, instead of through the pipeline.
Democrats are urging unemployed workers to lobby Republicans for extended benefits. They should instead lobby Democrats and the President to do what’s right for America: create the jobs they promised, by approving Keystone – along with drilling, fracking, mining, and reduced taxes and regulations.
America is waiting. Will there finally be real hope and change? Or just more hype and empty rhetoric?
_____________
Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org) and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – Black death.
* Acronym translator: Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Outer Continental Shelf, hydraulic fracturing, Keystone XL pipeline, absent without leave, State of the Union, carbon dioxide, catastrophic manmade global warming, President of the United States, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of the Interior, Department of Energy, Environmental Defense Fund, Natural Resources Defense Council.
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Unfortunately, like Arafat, he never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity to do all these things.
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Unfortunately, like Arafat, obama is anti-American.
3 Feb: UK Financial Times: Pilita Clark: Carbon capture backed to slash UK home energy bills
Household energy bills would be slashed by £82 a year if the government boosted carbon capturing equipment on power stations instead of relying so much on offshore wind farms to tackle climate change, research suggests.
Up to 30,000 construction jobs a year could eventually be created as well, according to analysis by the Trades Union Congress and the Carbon Capture and Storage Association of a technology that has struggled to make headway in Britain…
Britain is one of the best areas in the world to exploit CCS technology, says Frances O’Grady, TUC general secretary, pointing out that depleted North Sea gas and oil fields are ideal for storing captured gases…
***However, the process is so expensive that it can double the cost of building a power plant. As a result, it has failed to take off, despite the $25bn that governments have committed to it over the past six years…
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3a99a87e-8aae-11e3-ba54-00144feab7de.html
Unfortunately, like Arafat, he never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity – wow! The perfect quote. But Obama needs to consult with his “scientific” advisers first. Now – where’s Daryl Hannah, Al Gore, Boyance, Jay-Z, Neil Young, James Cameron, Pam Anderson, and the rest of his Hollywood scientific advisers?
“to convert corn to ethanol” What is the morality in this, in a hungry world? The greens have a lot to answer for, if there is a day of judgement!
CTV News Sunday Feb 2
Sandi Renaldo : “Now for those who thought the Keystone pipeline project could soon be a done deal, another reality check tonight. While the U.S. state department has dismissed environmental concerns about the plan to carry crude oil from Alberta to Texas, many hurdles remain. That was underlined forcefully when a key aid to Barack Obama appeared on television today. More from CTVs Omar Sachedina
Fireworks on Americas Sunday political talk shows. The White House chief of staff dodging a question about when the U.S. president will make a decision.
Denis McDonough “Washington loves a politics …undiscernible…
Other Guy “I didn’t ask about politics, you got a state department study.
W.H. Guy again “We have one department with a study, now we have other expert agencies, the EPA and many others who have a — energy department — opportunity to look at this.
Omar: ” Last summer Barack Obama said that the environment was key.
Obama: “The national interest will be served only if this project does not significantly exacerbate the problem of Carbon pollution.
Omar: “On Friday a report by the U.S. State department concluded those concerns are minimal. No substantive effects on climate change and any spills are expected to be rare and relatively small despite that no specific time line from Obama.
“On CTVs question period Canada natural resources minister said the president should not delay.
Joe Oliver, Natural resources minister : “Well his criterion has been met. The environmental issues have been dealt with.
Omar: “Words echoed by republican backers back in the U.S.
Bobby Jindal, Louisiana Governor “The Canadians are our closest allies, want us to become more energy independent.
Protestors “No KXL, No KXL…
Omar: “But protestors insist the project could cause an environmental disaster.
Josh Saks, National Wildlife Foundation “If ever there’s a spill, of course countless animals can be impacted (see next story on New York mayors and ground hogs 🙂 )
Omar: “Activists in the U.S. are already rounding up volunteers to participate in civil disobedience, meaning if the project gets approved Sandy, things could get ugly.
Sandy: “All right Omar, thank you.
Sandy: “We have dramatic video of Rob Ford in New York dropping a ground hog… wait.. Its not Rob Ford…. Never mind.
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Transcription services provided by the letters Q – W – E -R – T – and Y.
It’s simple. He wants none of those things. He is a LIAR.
The Keystone pipeline is a no brainier for the US. It is idiocy that groups such as 350.org have been able to block a project that is overwhelming in the best economic and strategic interest of the US.
Canada is the US’s largest trading partner. The US exports $300 billion dollars worth of goods and services to Canada every year as opposed to $100 billion dollars to China. Purchasing Canadian crude is win-win for the US and Canada as it provides the Canadians with an increase in GDP which will result in the Canadians being able to purchase more US goods and services both short term and long term, in addition to the jobs created in the US to construct and operate the pipeline. There are short term and long term multiplier effects when Canadian crude is purchased as opposed to purchasing Venezuelan or Saudi crude.
The Canadians must and do discount their crude oil to which is necessary to displace Venezuelan and Saudi crude oil. Cheaper Canadian crude will result in increased profits for US oil refineries which will both directly and indirectly result in short term and long term increases to the US GDP.
The Keystone pipeline provides the US with guaranteed secure access to long term secure petroleum reserves, in addition to the economic benefit of increased exports to the Canada and access to cheaper crude oil.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_trading_partners_of_the_United_States
The NAFTA free trade agreement includes a clause that provides the US with guaranteed continual access to petroleum supplies (petroleum exports to the US cannot be cut by the Canadians in event of for example a war in the Middle East.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Free_Trade_Agreement
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Petroleum_Reserve_%28United_States%29
The current inventory is displayed on the SPR’s website. As of December 21, 2012, the inventory was 694.9 million barrels (110,480,000 m3). This equates to 36 days of oil at current daily US consumption levels of 19.5 million barrels per day (3,100,000 m3/d).[1] At recent market prices ($102 a barrel as of February 2012[2]) the SPR holds over $26.7 billion in sweet crude and approximately $37.7 billion in sour crude (assuming a $15/barrel discount for sulfur content). The total value of the crude in the SPR is approximately $64.5 billion. The price paid for the oil is $20.1 billion (an average of $28.42 per barrel).[3]
The United States started the petroleum reserve in 1975 after oil supplies were cut off during the 1973-74 oil embargo, to mitigate future temporary supply disruptions. According to the World Factbook,[5] the United States imports a net 12 million barrels (1,900,000 m3) of oil a day (MMbd), so the SPR holds about a 58-day supply. However, the maximum total withdrawal capability from the SPR is only 4.4 million barrels (700,000 m3) per day, so it would take over 160 days to utilize the entire inventory.
Hangon, if Obama approves the Keystone pipeline, won’t that upset the Arabs, who recently payed so generously for his mate Al Gore’s TV station?
He can’t sign it yet, there’s still a bunch of rich enviromentalists that haven’t contributed yet.
This might be tied to two other things. First the US caving in on Iran’s nuclear proliferation so as to put more foreign oil on the market. The second is the Shell Oil Company’s failure to obtain drilling rights to the Arctic.
The US public is stupid as to what is going on. First there is no evidence short of the over all impression from the far right that the present administration efforts are to reshape the US along the lines of “Animal Farm”. Secondly, they have succeeded as far as Congress allows and now it is time to triple the executive orders along with more power Czars to ensure as much change as possible is done be fore this far left administration leaves office.
Environmental concerns and agendas are at the forefront. They want a US free of pollution, power with no record to our economy and population. Referring to the book again, we are being pressed into a Reservation.
Because they are pro-man-made global warming population they don’t see the overall affects that are happening with a solar sunspot minimum. Then again, the leaders of the new US partied and ate well while the General Washington suffered the extremes of a winter at Valley Forge, just shortly at the end of the mini-ice age.
As long as there is a high minimum wage and high union wages, Affordable Care Act and Trillions in debt, our NATO responsibilities will continue to decline, and the military ranks will do the same. VA medical will be drained to support Obama Care in the next few years and the VA hospital will be opened to the poor and homeless. Watch for General Z.’s resignation as Director of the VA.
When you fully realize this, most of the damaged will be done.
Paul Pierett
Unfortunately, your president seems a bit like my Aussie namesakes on two counts:
1. Says one thing but is actually doing pretty much the opposite.
2. Too focused on social engineering that is aimed at pleasing the fringe-element.
He’s doing his best to vote present. It’s his highest calling.
Good post; I could not agree more that we need to be using our resources to produce cheap and plentiful energy for the nation’s people. And for god’s sake let people eat corn and don’t put it in gas tanks of cars.
From today’s Wall Street Journal, an article about the benefits of shale gas that includes this bit of presidential history …
For years, greens and many on the political left have insisted that widespread adoption of renewable energy will create jobs and stimulate the economy. An example: In September 2008, then-candidate Barack Obama claimed at a speech in Golden, Colo., that his planned investments in “green” energy would create “five million new jobs that pay well and can’t ever be outsourced.”
This guy has had 2 years to make a decision about a lousy pipeline, and he still can’t decide. He has to be the most indecisive President ever. No wonder Obama garners so little respect.
BTW, the Keystone pipeline has been delivering oil to Illinois for 3 years now. Obama’s back yard. And he hasn’t said a word.
Many reasons have been given to build the Keystone Pipeline. Here is a reminder from the President as to why he should re-persuade himself of what he believed in. Going forwards does not mean going backwards. Thing may have changed from 1 year ago, but that doesn’t mean hanging around.
Just one year ago we got some pretty shocking news.
The one good thing about this whole CAGW scare is that our children and grandchildren will laugh hysterically at food to fuel, carbon capture schemes, useless windmills and dithering over easy to get shale oil across the border as opposed to oil in the unstable Middle East. They will have learned a lesson about climate scares and use our time of insanity as a cautionary lesson about not panicking over future climate changes.
Climastrology will be seen as a fringe group of ‘outliars’, a nutty group of pseudo scientists preaching heat during cooling episodes.
“This guy has had 2 years to make a decision about a lousy pipeline, and he still can’t decide. …”
Radical indecision looks remarkably like world’s-best-practice, if your speech-writing team are up to snuff. However, this is DC and you have to give the project every fighting-chance. Be professional, make sure all the bribes are big enough and go to the right people the first time. Oh, and the golden rule prevails of course, never-ever under any circumstances attempt to skimp on hookers ‘n blow.
KXL will not be built as long as Obama is president.
Regarding Keystone, it seems clear the President is behaving as he did regarding his health care reform: not truthfully.
Simply, there is no good reason to block KXL.
I watched them build a pipeline beside highway 22 in Southern Alberta. During the actual construction phase, several feet off the highway, there was very little disruption of any sort. The pipeline today is completely invisible, the only sign is building about the size of an elevator every few miles. Modern pipelines don’t leak. Modern pipelines have valves all along them that can be remotely operated to shut down and isolate sections in case of emergency, including earthquakes or attacks.
We all know that the “climate” aspect of opposition to KXL is a completely bogus fabrication. Even the anti-KXL people I talk to are aware it’s bogus, although I suppose there are still a few real believers somewhere out there. A simple Bing search for Keystone finds an amazing amount of discussion about something that should never have even entered public awareness, it’s a simple industrial effort less harmful than the average 2-lane highway.
Organized opposition to KXL was most likely purchased by the people who are making money transporting the oil in trains, which is an insane proposition. The article mentions the tragedy at Lac-Megantic, Quebec. Imagine being awakened from your sleep by your entire small town being engulfed in flames, oil tankers piled up like lego, some bodies found days later, most with barely enough remaining to even call a body.
We in Alberta are frankly shocked that any US administration could possibly be so stupid as to shut down something as essential and benign as a safe, clean transportation system for crude. Alberta is definitely hurting from this, since jobs and businesses were lined up ready to do this. A not insignificant portion of our economy was hurt, and remains hurting.
0bama is proving, again, that he is an incompetent buffoon. I heard a lot of talk about “special interests”, which democrats pretended to be against. Turns out they’re only against them when they are not THEIR special interests. Even the leftest of the left seem to drive everywhere, I still wonder where they think the gas for their vehicles is coming from.
Paul Pierett says: @ur momisugly February 3, 2014 at 1:56 am
…First there is no evidence short of the over all impression from the far right that the present administration efforts are to reshape the US along the lines of “Animal Farm”….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Since you made that claim you had better read these primary references that refute it.
POINT ONE
Let’s start with the critical passage from the UN. In the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat I) (1976)
Remember if you can not OWN PROPERTY, you are property. This is a critical point. Land ownership gives you the ability to be self sufficient and to produce wealth. If you can not own land you are nothing more than a free range serf working for corporations and then forking your earnings over to landlords.
The Habitat I agreement was ostensibly about human living space, but really sought to control ownership of land. It was signed by the USA.
Here is an excerpt:
Darn it. Mods I messed up the blockquotes off in post in moderation @ur momisugly February 3, 2014 at 5:23 am
Can yo please fix? Thanks
In related news, Kuwait is near completion of their 4th pipeline:
http://www.naturalgasasia.com/kncp-to-launch-fourth-gas-pipeline-project-11668
“Company’s Deputy Chief Executive Officer For Planning and Local Marketing Shukri Al-Mahrous.in an interview to “Alam Al-Mu’asasah” (KPC World) magazine, published by the Kuwaiti Petroleum Corporation, said the project includes building a fourth unit to treat liquefied oil gas, with a storage capacity of 805 million cubic feet of gas and 106,000 barrel per day of condensates, reports Kuwait News Agency (KUNA).”