Approves Asia Supply Route, Ignores US Route
H/T Eric Worrall and Breitbart – Obama’s inability to make a decision on Keystone has finally yielded a result – Canada has made the decision for him.
Breitbart reports Canada has just approved the Enbridge Northern Gateway Project – a major pipeline to ship Canadian oil to Asia.
The Canadian oil will still be burnt – in Asia, instead of America.
All the jobs and energy security which Canadian oil could have delivered to America, will instead be delivered to Asia.
Rather than purchasing crude from a friendly and allied neighbor, the United States will most likely need to continue its reliance upon hostile sources like Venezuela. Energy analysts had hoped that construction of Keystone could have replaced almost half of the current U.S. daily crude purchases from that volatile, anti-American dictatorship, depriving Venezuela of the resources it relies upon to stay in power and fund its Cuban allies.
You can’t say Canada didn’t give America a chance – they waited years for the American administration to come to their senses. But in the end, they couldn’t wait any longer, and have put the interests of Canadians first.
Below is a helpful timeline of Keystone events, courtesy of Al Jazeera.
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KokoofKanada@1:03
Fortunately, it’s not up to the province. Pipelines fall under federal jurisdiction, so a straight NIMBY by the province will not work. The bigger risk is in dealing with each of the independent Indian bands. Most of them have no treaties (unlike on the prairies) so each will line up for what they think is “fair”. Many of the reserves in that area, where I grew up, have no idea what makes a functioning economy. That’s why I’m now an Albertan – I went to a place in Canada where I could use my skills, work, and prosper. The reserves back around “home” are content to make sure that nothing gets developed unless they get “their share” on the basis of them being here before us, and our ancestors not being willing to countenance a genocide. Once the chiefs are promised a share that they think is sufficient (and that they think is bigger than the other chiefs will get – expect a lot of confidentiality demands on the parts of the reservations), the pipeline will have no problems.
(general comments follow)
I’m not mining oil at the moment, but know enough about the area to know that the oil miners aren’t too worried about how the product will get to market. Given the money already in play, the Oilsands output will likely double within 15 years. Pipelines or rail or trucks, there are lots of ways to move the product. There is a multi-tiered royalty set-up in Alberta that gives the province some money based upon how much is mined, but even more based on the profits of what is mined. This gives the province a vested interest is spurring development – that’s even the purpose of the Alberta government’s AER – Alberta Energy Regulator – mandated to maximize extraction of energy resources as part of the licencing process. There is also a lot more oil there than are listed on any statement of resources – the listed levels of geologic certainty for any statement of resources is dependent upon drill spacing and complexity of the deposit. If you already have 50 years worth of mining planned in your reserves then why spend the money drilling to expand your resource base now? Underground oil will probably be different, but in surface mining it’s common that the minable reserves are around 30% of the resources (the difference between what is conceptually recoverable, and what the mine plan can develop). As long as you can keep the lease and have enough holes to know that there’s something there, you’re good.
Particularly rich beds of bitumen come out of the ground like an area of beach sand that has had a crankcase emptied onto it – I remember the augers gleaming and running like thin molasses in the -30 dawn while we were sampling. I also remember how the not-so-rich areas did act like pavement – the augers were rejected, and the split spoon wouldn’t penetrate more than an inch after 50 reps with the hammer. The host material varied from a clean sand to what acted like bitumen impregnated till (with silt and/or clay as the matrix). We could tell the depth to the bitumen by the height of the pine trees: once the taproot hit the surface of the oil, the tree died. All run-off water from the swamp had a rainbow tinge naturally. If the water had passed through our dewatering pumps it had to be treated as hazardous waste unless it found a way back under the surface of the ground. The Oilsands really are a huge natural oil spill, and they have been draining into the Athabasca River and up to the Arctic Ocean for over 1000 years. Judging by some bitumen contaminated gravel beds we found, they’ve been more likely cut by rivers for the last 100,000 years. To me, opposition to mining the Oilsands really shows the watermelon leanings of some groups – they’re perfectly all right with leaving the area a poisonous wasteland with little biodiversity if the alternative is someone else making a profit.
What can we expect from Obama? Obama is “divisive and stupid.” The only other explanation is that Obama is deliberately undermining the USA.
The following proves my point.
On 6-25-2014 the NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION reported that the USA has been COOLING for the LAST TEN YEARS!
THE SAME DAY Obama appeared at the “League of Conservation Voters Capital Dinner” and MOCKED – I repeat, MOCKED – global warming deniers.
What is wrong with Obama? Is he mentally ill.
Tar sands oil is very thick, as is Venezuelan oil. There are only a few refineries that can handle that feedstock, most being on the Gulf coast. I don’t think Keystone ever was strictly to reduce gasoline prices here in the US.
For the last time all you humps It’s oil sand not tar sands tar sand’s is in LA Please get it together ;>)
My bet is that there were far more roadblocks to this pipeline than just the present administration.
Thirty five years ago, when I began my law career, I began it as an oil and gas right of way attorney. I can guarantee all of you that oil and gas pipelines are not something most people want running through their yards. A surprising number of people will litigate against a right-of-way taking they don’t like. When multiple and concerted litigation begins to develop to stop a pipeline running through people’s yards, it can get extremely expensive. No matter how big you are, you can’t litigate with every body.
Moreover, states that don’t get much benefit from a pipeline but face huge damages if something bad happens don’t like the risk benefit ratios either and throw up their own roadblocks as well.
This pipeline was going to be of little benefit to most of the people along it.
From what I can tell, most of the loud complaining about this pipeline came from people who did not want the pipelines near them or running through their state. It seemed to be unpopular in nearly every state it was running through. Canada is having the same problem in a number of its provinces. Blaming Obama for this is a convenient excuse for something that was quite unpopular where people could throw up roadblocks.
@dbstealey. I left the Democrats out because there is a big difference in asking for war and going along with one that is asked for. I guess you forgot about Bush’s address to Congress, and the lie about the yellowcake in the address to Congress, and the lie about the weapons of mass destruction, and Colon Powell’s falsified address to the UN. And you must have forgot about how we were going to be seen as liberators and how the war would only last a couple of months and would pay for itself.
I never let the Democrats off the hook for supporting the war, but when the commander in chief is saying we need to do it, and his generals are saying we need to do it, and his faulty intelligence (fraudulent really with Cheney’s in house intelligence Iraq War Group), comparing the complicity of the Democrats with the outright instigation of war by the Republicans is ludicrous. False equivalency of the worst kind. The buck stopped with the president who started it. Republicans will always own it. Comparing Obama to this $hit is utterly ridiculous. I have other suspicions as to the true reasons for your views but I will not start that here.
Obamas Plan to destroy America continues with allowing Oil prices to increase;
CONGRESSMEN: OBAMA USING ‘CLOWARD-PIVEN MANEUVER’
‘Attempt to flood the border with illegals’ part of infamous socialist strategy-, professors Andrew Cloward and Francis Fox Piven of Columbia University, Obama’s alma mater, devised a plan to provoke chaos by deliberately overwhelming governmental systems and the U.S. economy to the point of collapse, paving the way for state intervention that would ultimately replace America’s free-enterprise republic with a collectivist system.
http://www.wnd.com/2014/06/congressmen-obama-using-cloward-piven-maneuver/
Gas was $1.86 when OBAMA TOOK OFFICE. His plan to destroy America, by transfer of wealth is nearly complete.
Clayton E. Cramer says: June 30, 2014 at 3:15 pm
“First the US think that the oil sands are theirs.”
No, we think of them as belonging to our best, closest, and most sensible friend. And that’s how we thought of Canada even BEFORE the oil was found.
******************
Thank you Clayton.
Today, July 1 is Canada Day, our National Holiday.
In three more days, the USA, our closest neighbour and best friend will celebrate the Fourth of July, Independence Day.
God Bless Canada!
And God Bless America!
davidgmills says:
The buck stopped with the president who started it. Republicans will always own it.
You’re nuts. The current Administration promised Americans that we would be out of Afghanistan. Now, Obama owns that war.
You are far too partisan to understand.
Here is a good short video about the origins of the Athabasca oilsands industry.
http://www.suncor.com/en/about/2629.aspx?id=2600
Although there were predecessors, I believe that the individual most responsible for the founding of the modern Athabasca oilsands mining industry is J. Howard Pew of the Sun Oil Company of Philadelphia (now Suncor), the majority shareholder in the Great Canadian Oilsands project. Other mostly American companies followed with the development of the Syncrude project.
The invention of SAGD extraction, largely through the efforts of AOSTRA, enabled the economic recovery of the much greater deposits of deeper oilsands, through in-situ recovery.
The Canadian oilsands are now the economic mainstay of our country, and as a result we have the strongest economy in the G8.
Our oilsands industry developed over many years with considerable difficulty, and has experienced periods of major progress followed by extended periods of inactivity, followed by revitalization.
Politicians should tread carefully when intervening in energy policy. A few politicians have contributed greatly to our prosperity through their interventions, but the majority have utterly failed.
Technically ignorant politicians who have dabbled in energy policy have caused enormous economic damage and needless waste.
Cheap abundant energy is the lifeblood of a modern economy.
Good! We don’t want your damn pipeline. It would contaminate the Ogallala Aquifer, thus ending all irrigation for all farms in the Midwest. That would destroy all Midwestern farming, sending food prices through the roof and destroying the economy. It would rape my home state of Nebraska. Not just no, but HELL NO! It sucks that the oil will still be burned, but at least its not touching that aquifer. This project would have made my home state uninhabitable.
Brandon N,
Your extremely emotional, wild-eyed comment is preposterous. You say:
We don’t want your damn pipeline. It would contaminate the Ogallala Aquifer, thus ending all irrigation for all farms in the Midwest. That would destroy all Midwestern farming, sending food prices through the roof and destroying the economy. It would rape my home state of Nebraska… This project would have made my home state uninhabitable.
That is such an over the top, swivel-eyed comment that it leaves you with zero credibility.
A pipeline isn’t much different from rail. I suppose you would prefer 40 – 70 year old rolling stock to a new, state of the art pipeline with all the latest safety features.
Why is it that enviro-nuts are such lunatics? Take an aspirin and lie down. Your head is likely to explode. Leave this discussion to rational adults.
No one wants to sell to communists, you can’t trust them to be able to pay their bills. I am talking of course about the USSA. Au revoir, you commies.
Just a minor technical comment: The objections made by the BC authorities seem reasonable, because the Heavy Oil blend they are shipping to the Pacific is likely to a be a “dumbell crude”. These crudes are characterized for having a large fraction of very heavy asphaltic crude and a blend material made up of naphta and possibly other light crudes. In other words, this material tends to be short on the middle chains. When this material is spilled the light fractions evaporate or get eaten. But the heavy molecules are the ones which make a mess.
To solve the objections the crude needs to be a synbit, that is a mixture of the super heavy 8 degrees API with a medium weight syncrude (say 27 degrees API). To make the syncrude they do need upgraders. And as far as I can tell, the government needs to push to see if nuclear powered upgrading may not be a sensible option. It´s a far reach but these studies have already been carried out.
[snip – REPLY: I ask that you resubmit this without the name calling and derogatory tone – Anthony]
@dbstealey Don’t expect the people who are going to be asked to have a pipeline running through their front yard to give a damn as to whether you can drive your Suburban or not. Evidence of more political cluelessness on your part.
As for the price of gas when Obama took over. It had been much higher before that. My house was down 40% by the time Obama took over, as were most of my stocks. Most prices and values were hugely depressed when this administration took over. Stocks (those things that the wealthy usually have in abundance that most of middle class America doesn’t) have done great during this administration. Unfortunately, real estate, which is often the major asset of the middle class has gone nowhere because jobs paying a decent wage don’t exist for much of America any more. Trickle down economics has been a total failure because it was always a sham, a lame excuse to justify unregulated greed.
The Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline was proposed 40 years ago. The first version was torpedoed by Trudeau’s National Energy Policy. It was resurrected in 2004, but crashing gas prices made it uneconomic. The plans still sit there. Recently the North West Territorial government suggested the route be used to take oil north to a port; or even over to connect into the Valdez pipeline. There is also a railway proposal to take oil to Valdez. This is not a time sensitive project, but a dollar sensitive project. When the value is there, it will flow, one way or another.
As for Keystone, it will likely take a change in US leadership. Companies can wait 4 or 8 or 12 years. As others have noted, the oil is going south and east anyway. Just less efficiently. When it does get approval, hopefully my dividends in my retirement funds will increase …
For those who don’t want a pipeline, it is simply a matter of choosing your poison. Don’t like pipelines, you get rail
Don’t like fossil fuels – stop driving, shut off your plastic computer and phone, forget about anything with steel (metallurgical coal don’t you know), go back to ploughing your own garden with your horse and wooden plough and lighting your home with tallow candles from the sheep you raise for wool clothing and the cotton you grow for the same reason. Yeah right. If people only knew how much of their surroundings were made using fossil fuels they might moderate their NIMBY positions.
For davidgmills says: June 30, 2014 at 9:11 pm remember that all those people in Nebraska and other states that farm are using diesel fuel, using petrochemicals of all sorts, polycarbonates etc. etc. EVERYONE benefits from fossil fuels. They should be reminded.
Wayne Delbeke
Eric Worrall says:
June 29, 2014 at 5:26 am
TAG
Part of the NAFTA agreement is that Canada is compelled to “share” its oil and other resources with the US. So in the case of an oil shortage, Canada is compelled to ship oil to the US.
I’ve hear many right and left wing Americans whine about NAFTA. Actually it is a pretty good deal for the US. Canada got access to US markets by becoming absolutely economically dependent on it.
If exporting oil to China rises in importance, NAFTA may seem like less of a priority. Don’t forget, Canada pulled out of Kyoto when Kyoto became inconvenient – when Kyoto got in the way of exploiting the tar sands. If China becomes the more important trading partner, then agreements with America may be set aside.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Various US politicians have been talking about killing NAFTA for years. Many want to renegotiate a sweeter deal for the US. Like the Columbia River Treaty, it seems when times change, politicians start using these things as sales tools, regardless of how well they have worked for both sides. Add softwood lumber and salmon to that. We are good neighbours, but we do bicker a lot like some married couples.
Brandon N says:
July 1, 2014 at 10:04 am
Good! We don’t want your damn pipeline. It would contaminate the Ogallala Aquifer, thus ending all irrigation for all farms in the Midwest. That would destroy all Midwestern farming, sending food prices through the roof and destroying the economy. It would rape my home state of Nebraska. Not just no, but HELL NO! It sucks that the oil will still be burned, but at least its not touching that aquifer. This project would have made my home state uninhabitable.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
It is much more likely your home state will be made uninhabitable by over pumping of the Ogallala aquifer to produce ethanol and bio-diesel from irrigated crops, thus necessitating an oil pipeline when the corn crops fail due to lack of water. By the way, I have ridden on horseback across your entire home state and a few adjacent to it. Much better view on horse back than on those jointed bouncy concrete freeways. But at 50 miles a day, it takes a while. What a fossil fuel powered vehicle does in 45 minutes, takes a day on horse back. Want those farmers out there going back to horse farming and depending on rain? Big corn will ruin your home state way before big oil. Come ride with me sometime. 2015 is going to be a Pony Express year. 2000 miles from St Joe, Missouri to Carson City, Nevada on horseback. Great way to see your country and appreciate the 1 death per mile on the old Oregon Trail along the Platte River that your and my very tough forefathers opened up. I never want to have to go back to that, so I use a big diesel tractor at home and so do other farm and ranch folk, and I bet you drive to work too. I walk out my front door to my job.
From your Canadian friend that loves riding horses long distances in the good ol’ US of A.
davidgmills says:
July 1, 2014 at 5:33 pm [ ” … ” ]
Since my comment was about the war in Afghanistan and you completely avoided responding to it, I guess that point is scored. ☺
Brandon N says:
“Good! We don’t want your damn pipeline. It would contaminate the Ogallala Aquifer, thus ending all irrigation for all farms in the Midwest. That would destroy all Midwestern farming, sending food prices through the roof and destroying the economy. It would rape my home state of Nebraska. Not just no, but HELL NO! It sucks that the oil will still be burned, but at least its not touching that aquifer. This project would have made my home state uninhabitable.”
We needed a good example of ecolunacy on here. The Ogallala already has literally thousands of oil and gas wells drilled through it. In fact, the first hydraulic fracture treatment was conducted on a well that was drilled through the Ogallala and hundreds more have followed. There are already thousands of miles of oil and gas pipeline running through the area where the Ogallala is extant. Despite all of this oil and gas activity, that has been going on for more than 50 years in the region, Midwest farming has not been destroyed. Your comment is based entirely on fictitious fear-mongering that has been stamped into that space between your ears by the liberal media.
@dbstealy You just claim it to be Obama’s war. Please explain how it is Obama’s war since Bush put us in there in 2001. If you will recall, none of the 19 highjackers were from Afghanistan, yet the Bush administration insisted that we needed to invade a country that had done nothing to us. We were told needed to get the mastermind, Osama Bin Laden. Well, did Bush get him? No he left him for Obama to get and it took a build up of men and material to do it.
Saying Afghanistan is Obama’s war is like saying Vietnam was Nixon’s war, when Nixon didn’t get us out of Vietnam right away. Do people call Vietnam Nixon’s war?
Do I wish Obama had extricated us out of both of Bush’s wars as his first act of his presidency? Absolutely. Obama has not closed down Guantanamo either, another Bush disaster. I wish Obama had done that, as well as a whole host of other things he has not done, such as prosecute half of Wall Street, for the financial catastrophe caused by them during the lax and sleepy Bush administration.
The simple truth is that there are a lot of people in the military industrial complex with lots of clout, and who made vast amounts of money on Bush’s wars and want them to continue. As General Smedley Butler, the most acclaimed Marine in history, eloquently stated in the 1930’s: “War is a racket.” Once the racket is in full swing, it is not easy to put a stop to it. Nixon could have told you that.
OK Enough About war – Db Stealy and David G Mills you need to both be done on the wild off topic comments or the next comments from both of you end up int eh bit bucket
Thank an environmentalist for the loss of good paying skilled labor jobs. Every union that supported Obama should be proud of themselves for cutting their own economic throats.
@ur momisugly Robert W Turner. You can call it ecolunacy if you like, and rage against the NIMBY syndrome all you want, but people who do not have pipelines in their yards do not want them there. Hell, a pipeline running through my front yard would devastate my property values. It would do the same to yours. Any income you got from a forced selling of part of your property (which is what eminent domain/condemnation is) would in all probability be unsatisfactory compensation to you, even if you got fair market value or better. Roads and rails are already property that has been taken by eminent domain and is is not difficult to see how people who do not want to have their property seized would much prefer to have this oil trucked over the roads or shipped by train.
But a thorium nuclear power revolution, (which should have been here a long time ago because the technology was invented at Oak Ridge in the 1960’s) and which is my particular energy favorite, would solve all of the world’s energy problems, including fuel transport. It might decimate the value of my Exxon stock, (which is a substantial portion of my retirement) but, so be it. Progress will go on even if Exxon opposes it.
policycritic,
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Alan Broadbent, Past-Chair
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