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This doesn't sound very promising in any way. Not ecologically, not fiscally, not historically and certainly not people-friendly. All the way from Canada to Texas, right through the heart of the Great Plains, it will tear up the countryside and probably never benefit one single American person. We must adjust to the fact that this is how our gubment now operates.
Can't you just see it - - - America continues to BUY oil from the Middle East and the Middle East will buy it from us. OR even worse, the Middle East will buy it from us and sell it back to us. I can see that happening, actually. Wouldn't surprise me at all.
Good bit of journalism by Grist.
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http://www.grist.org/oil/2011-07-17-keystone-xl-tar-sands-pipeline-would-screw-over-farmers
[excerpt]
Keystone XL won’t carry “light, sweet” crude, which floats on top of water and can be mopped up with absorbent booms. Bitumen—a tarlike substance mined from the Alberta tar sands, chemically diluted, and heated to improve flow—will travel at high pressure across Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas to Gulf Coast refineries. If and when it leaks into water bodies, this product will sink. To judge the risk of that happening, it helps to know that the first piece of the Keystone system, TransCanada’s Keystone I pipeline that crosses the eastern Dakotas, has sprung a dozen leaks in its first year of operation.
Our nonprofit, Plains Justice, has been following this unfolding mess since we took the first calls about Keystone I from North Dakota landowners in 2007. They were getting bullying letters from TransCanada insisting that they sign pipeline easements immediately or see their land condemned. Appeals to state regulators in North and South Dakota fell on deaf ears. In the Dakotas, the oil industry has near-monolithic political power and hires lawyers in bulk. There was no resisting its plans for a pipeline across farms, tribal ancestral homelands, and even the drinking water catchment area for the city of Fargo, which only became aware of the risk after state regulators had signed off on the project.
[end of excerpt]
Can't you just see it - - - America continues to BUY oil from the Middle East and the Middle East will buy it from us. OR even worse, the Middle East will buy it from us and sell it back to us. I can see that happening, actually. Wouldn't surprise me at all.
Good bit of journalism by Grist.
=================
http://www.grist.org/oil/2011-07-17-keystone-xl-tar-sands-pipeline-would-screw-over-farmers
[excerpt]
Keystone XL won’t carry “light, sweet” crude, which floats on top of water and can be mopped up with absorbent booms. Bitumen—a tarlike substance mined from the Alberta tar sands, chemically diluted, and heated to improve flow—will travel at high pressure across Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas to Gulf Coast refineries. If and when it leaks into water bodies, this product will sink. To judge the risk of that happening, it helps to know that the first piece of the Keystone system, TransCanada’s Keystone I pipeline that crosses the eastern Dakotas, has sprung a dozen leaks in its first year of operation.
Our nonprofit, Plains Justice, has been following this unfolding mess since we took the first calls about Keystone I from North Dakota landowners in 2007. They were getting bullying letters from TransCanada insisting that they sign pipeline easements immediately or see their land condemned. Appeals to state regulators in North and South Dakota fell on deaf ears. In the Dakotas, the oil industry has near-monolithic political power and hires lawyers in bulk. There was no resisting its plans for a pipeline across farms, tribal ancestral homelands, and even the drinking water catchment area for the city of Fargo, which only became aware of the risk after state regulators had signed off on the project.
[end of excerpt]


Shoot for the Moon. Even if you miss, you'll land amongst the stars. - Anonymous