Building the Keystone XL pipeline could lead to as much as four times more greenhouse gas emissions than the State Department has estimated for the controversial project, according to a new study published in Nature Climate Change that relies on different calculations about oil consumption.
The U.S. Senate rejected by a one-vote margin a bill passed by the House to allow construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline, which would carry oil from Canada to Gulf of Mexico refineries. The measure needed 60 votes to go forward but received 59. White House advisers have suggested that President Barack Obama might eventually let the project proceed.
The House passed legislation approving the Keystone XL pipeline. President Barack Obama has vowed to veto the bill.The legislation, approved 270-152 by the GOP-controlled House, authorizes TransCanada Corp. , to construct the 1,179-mile pipeline, which has been under review by the Obama administration for more than six years. The Senate, also in Republicans' hands, passed the legislation late last month.
TransCanada wants the US to pay it $15 billion to recoup costs and damages related to President Barack Obama's refusal to approve the Keystone XL oil pipeline. In addition to planning the claim under the North American Free Trade Agreement, the company sued the US government in federal court in Texas, claiming Obama's November decision exceeded his constitutional authority.
With the Keystone XL and other pipeline projects running into stiff opposition, Alberta's tar sands industry is facing growing pressure to find ways to get its oil to market. One option under consideration would be to ship the oil via an increasingly ice-free Arctic Ocean.
Thousands of barrels of tar-sands oil have been burbling up into forest areas for at least six weeks in Cold Lake, Alberta, and it seems that nobody knows how to staunch the flow.