This is what Keystone bribes will buy - Tar Sands Mine, north of Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada.
Your entire congressional delegation is pushing for expedited construction of the Keystone XL pipeline based on faulty information. It’s not surprising given that Senator Baucus and Representative Rehberg have accepted more than a million dollars in dirty energy campaign money. They need to hear from you now.
The proposed 36-inch pipe will have a capacity of 900,000 barrels per day of some of the most filthy oil on the planet. This pipe carries tar sands crude which creates three times the amount of greenhouse gases as normal crude oil extraction. The pipe will cross hundreds of streams and small drainages in Montana. Any spill of this stuff into Montana waters would be many times more damaging than the Yellowstone River spill earlier this year.
TransCanada makes extravagant claims for the jobs created by this pipeline, but a recent State Department report puts the number of jobs during construction at only 5,000 to 6,000, almost all of which would disappear after construction. Republicans are calling this a shovel-ready jobs creator, but the majority of the shovels would be wielded by workers cleaning up the spilled crude. The existing Keystone pipeline had 12 major spills last year. The 2,794 pipeline spills last year included 275,000 gallons in Michigan and 126,000 gallons in North Dakota and killed 161 people. For comparison, the spill into the Yellowstone River was about 40,000 gallons and reported cost Exxon $135 million to clean up. If you think those costs aren’t coming out of your taxes or transportation costs, think again.
Almost all of the oil from the tar sands will be transported to Texas for export abroad. Not only will the tar sands oil not help with the U.S. oil imports, it may actually increase gasoline costs to U.S. consumers by relieving a current glut of Canadian crude oil in the Midwest which would be picked up by the XL pipeline.
President Obama recently delayed approval of the XL pipeline, but the big oil money is pushing Congress for speedy approval with millions of dollars in bribes to legislators. Congressman Rehberg has sold out to big oil once again by authoring legislation to give the administration 60 days to make this important decision. Montana’s Senators and Representative need to hear from Montanans that this pipeline is just a disaster waiting to happen. Let them know that we don’t need to become a conduit and dumping ground for more foreign oil at the cost of our pristine Montana environment.
Filed under: Button Valley News, Climate Change, Energy Industry, Montana Environment, Montana News, Montana People, Montana Politics
