WASHINGTON – U.S. President Barack Obama, confronted again by environmental protesters while on a campaign-style swing through the Midwest, insisted Wednesday that his administration has not made any decision on TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL.
Obama was in Denver, making an appearance at the University of Colorado, when a protester yelled that he should block the $7-billion project to transport Alberta oilsands crude through six American states to Gulf Coast refineries.
“I know your deep concern about it,” he told the protester after pausing in his speech. “We will address it.”
The president’s comments came amid reports that the U.S. State Department, scheduled to rule on whether to green-light Keystone XL by the end of the year, might delay its decision.
Delays can be every bit as damning to a project like Keystone XL as the outright demise of the pipeline, said Mark Lewis, a pipeline law specialist at Bracewell and Giuliani LLP in Washington.
“It’s like death by a thousand cuts,” Lewis said in an interview.
“The producers need to get their product to market. If this is delayed, and if there’s another project being built to move their product to the West Coast, then producers may commit their product to that project. There’s a limited amount of product, and delay in Keystone could cause the market to move elsewhere.”
The U.S. environmental movement has been galvanized by the pipeline debate, using it as a springboard to a larger ideological battle over the need for Americans to end their appetite for fossil fuels and embrace renewable sources of energy.
The opposition has spread to U.S. Congress as several Democratic lawmakers have urged Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to block the project because of a federal approval process they have described as hopelessly tainted.
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On Wednesday, another group of 14 lawmakers – Democrats and an independent – took the fight to the U.S. inspector general. In a letter to Harold Geisel, they urged his office to launch an investigation into the State Department’s conduct as it’s assessed the proposed pipeline.
“Given the significant economic, environmental, and public health implications of the proposed pipeline, we believe that it is critical that the State Department conduct thorough, unbiased reviews of the project,” their letter read.
In a separate dispatch to Obama, the senators – led by independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Tennessee Democrat Steve Cohen – urged the president to hold off on approving the pipeline until the completion of the investigation they’ve asked for from Geisel.
The State Department’s final decision on the pipeline is expected by the end of the year. It’s responsible for determining the fate of Keystone XL because it would cross an international border if approved.
Environmentalists claim the fix is in, partly because one of Calgary-based TransCanada’s key lobbyists, Paul Elliott, worked for Clinton’s unsuccessful bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008.
They point to emails recently released by the State Department following freedom-of-information requests that suggest a cosy relationship between Elliott and some department officials. In one particularly friendly email exchange, a State Department employee working at the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa cheers on Elliott’s attempts to win approval for the pipeline.
State Department officials are also facing allegations that they hired Texas-based Cardno Entrix, an environmental consulting firm, to conduct an environmental analysis of Keystone XL after TransCanada itself recommended the company. Cardno Entrix subsequently gave the pipeline the thumbs up.
It’s all made for a political hot potato for the Obama administration. At another event in San Francisco on Tuesday night, 1,000 demonstrators protested outside an Obama fundraiser.
Among them were some big-time Democratic party donors, including Susie Tompkins Buell, a co-founder of the Esprit clothing company and a longtime friend of Clinton’s, as well as one of the biggest donors to her 2008 campaign.
Another donor vowed to keep his wallet closed in the event Keystone XL gets the green light.
“If he says yes (to Keystone), I won’t give him money,” Michael Kieschnick, president and co-founder of CREDO Mobile and Working Assets, told the San Francisco Chronicle. Kieschnick’s company has donated $60 million to progressive causes.
Even if Washington lawmakers fail in blocking the project, TransCanada is facing another potential hurdle in Nebraska.
Earlier this week, Dave Heineman, the state’s Republican governor, called a special session of the state legislature to discuss whether to make an attempt to block Keystone XL “in a legal and constitutional manner.”
At odds with other governors impacted by the pipeline, Heineman is opposed because Keystone XL traverses the Ogallala aquifer, a crucial source of drinking water for the region. He wants TransCanada to change the route of the pipeline.
TransCanada has said it cannot legally change the course of the route, adding any such alteration would mean the entire approval process would have to start over again.
Several environmental groups are planning an anti-pipeline rally outside the White House on Nov. 6. Hundreds of people were arrested outside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue this summer in a series of sit-ins.
Environmentalists oppose the pipeline because of the high amounts of greenhouse gas emissions associated with Alberta oilsands production and concerns about pipeline leaks along Keystone XL’s proposed path.
Pipeline proponents, meanwhile, argue that the pipeline will create thousands of jobs and help end American reliance on oil from sometimes hostile OPEC regimes. TransCanada has also vowed to adhere to tough safety standards that exceed American requirements.
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