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DOE study finds Keystone XL not needed
By Liz Barrat-Brown
Wednesday, February 02, 2011
Read this blog post on the originating site
On the eve of the Canadian Prime Minister’s visit to the White House this Friday, the Department of State made an analysis of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline public. The analysis, commissioned by the Department of Energy and done by consulting firm Ensys Energy, looked at multiple scenarios to evaluate what the effect of building the Keystone XL and other tar sands pipelines, notably those to Canada’s west coast, would be on crude oil supply, price, and refinery operations. The analysis also included a greenhouse gas assessment done by DOE.
Here are the most salient points:
1. Keystone XL is not needed well into the foreseeable future: As we expected, the analysis found that there was tar sands pipeline overcapacity up to the early 2020s and possibly until 2030. It also found that there were other pathways to the Gulf for companies interested in moving tar sands crude from the Midwest to the Gulf coast. This is a point that we have been repeatedly making. Why rush a decision to build a giant pipeline that will be with us, supplying oil from the controversial tar sands in Canada’s Boreal forest, for the next 50 years? Aren’t there other alternatives for our fuels that we can, and must, find in this time period? This will be a major consideration as the Administration moves to the National Interest Determination process after the Environmental Impact Statement is completed. It is hard to make a case for this pipeline, especially given all the trade-offs in potential damage to one of our largest aquifers, the Ogallala, a point repeatedly made by Nebraskan public officials from both sides of the aisle.
2. Sending large quantities of tar sands oil to Asia is an uncertain outcome: As we also expected, the analysis found that building pipelines to the northern British Columbia coast was uncertain because of opposition to these pipelines by First Nations – the native people living on the coast and along the pipeline routes – and by environmentalists. More likely were smaller pipeline proposals for going South to Vancouver. These would increase pipeline capacity to Vancouver by 400,000 barrels of oil per day (for perspective, we use nearly 20 million barrels per day in the U.S.). The “Asia threat” has been a card the Canadians like to play when the U.S. moves forward to control high carbon fuels and reduce our oil use. It is hard to imagine these small amounts being worthy of the uproar this positioning has caused.
Keep reading this blog entry on the NRDC website
Tagged with: keystone xl, department of energy
