Wednesday, January 18

Dear Liberals, YOU WANT THE KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE

Let's try this again. I previously wrote about the pipeline in my post 'Keystone XL Pipeline - You Don't Get a Much Better Example of How Anti-Business (and Petty) This Administration is'. I noted:
There is one thing that really gets me about the battle over whether the Obama Administration will permit the building of a pipeline to carry oil from Canada to oil refineries in the United States. That is that this battle is going on at all. Really, at it's simplest level, the Keystone XL pipeline is a business project. A pipeline. - Link
Today, the President once again came out front and center and killed this business project. Surely, the non-union portion of his Liberal base is celebrating this victory. But be careful what you wish for, because killing this oil pipline is only going to force the Canadians to transport this oil in more environmentally risky ways.

This oil will be moved to market, and by removing the safest and cheapest transport method will merely result in this cargo traveling via other means to get to refineries. The main alternatives to moving liquids by pipeline are moving them by tanker truck, ships, barges and rail cars.

This oil will most likely be sent through existing pipelines to be exported from Canada by tanker. In which case others will benefit for America's stupidity. The Merchant Mariner in me is just fine with killing off any pipeline as pipelines 'steal' cargo from tankers. Mobil Oil used to have a number of gasoline tankers bringing gasoline from Texas to the Port of New York. A pipeline put at least five tankers and their crews out of work. So you can bet that the tanker companies are not complaining about today's decision.

Better yet, some of this Canadian oil may still end up at the same refineries that it was destined for via the pipeline. See the map below to get a reminder of how far oil from the Middle East travels to get to the US. Taking this oil from Canada is a no-brainer, even if it has to travel a more expensive, more dangerous route. Really, just how do they think we get oil pumped out of the ground in Alaska?



Liberals however like to pretend that this oil will somehow just remain in the ground if they put up enough roadblocks in the way of getting this oil to market. This of course will never happen

As a reminder, the dispute is about whether a pipeline will be built. And it's not like this is a new idea. As the map below illustrates, the United States is already covered by pipelines. Then there is the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, built in one of the world's most sensitive, and environmentally brutal climates. Nor would this be the first oil pipeline from Canada either. The only reason this pipeline is having problems is because this is the first time the US Government was being run by an Administration that is both anti-business, anti-jobs and anti-oil. The President was given the opportunity to kill a project that will bring energy into the US from a friendly neighbor.

Too bad we can't run our cars and heat our homes on hope.

(Map found here) 




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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The correct business decision would be to build the shortest most direct route to the sea. The pipeline through the US is just an oil spill waiting to happen.

The environmental damage and the economies of tar shale oil is a whole different argument.

Fred Fry said...

You don't understand. The pipeline is the shortest safest mode of transportation for the oil to get to the refineries, which is where the oil needs to get to.