They are taking hope from a reference in Obama’s inaugural speech last week regarding the climate change crisis in which he pledged not to “betray our children and future generations.”
The U.S. president left many wondering if that commitment was any sort of reference to Keystone XL, which oilsands producers say they desperately need, and which — pending an okay from the State Department by March — awaits Obama’s stamp of approval.
He has delayed a decision on the pipeline because of concerns about its route through a Nebraska aquifer. But last week, Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman signed off on a revised route.
Doesn’t change a thing, insists the New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council, arguing the Nebraska segment constitutes “just a small portion” of the pipeline.
Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org., a San Fransisco-based environmental group, intoned: “We will do all we can to help the president realize his goals, and trust he’ll begin by blocking the Keystone XL pipeline, whose approval would make a mockery of his rhetoric.”
Environmentalists are now busy organizing “the largest climate rally in U.S. history,” set for Feb. 17 in Washington, D.C.
For the activists, this struggle against Keystone XL is about far more than a pipeline running from Hardisty, Alberta to Houston, Texas.
Their movement is part of a strategic continental effort to choke off Alberta’s oilsands.
Environmentalists aim to nix any new pipeline capacity flowing from the oilsands in order to depress bitumen prices to the point where it becomes uneconomic to produce petroleum from what they call the dirtiest oil development on earth.
In a backgrounder on Keystone XL earlier this month, Nathan Lemphers, of the Alberta-based Pembina Institute, says pipelines are the primary enabler of oilsands growth. Keystone XL, alone, would prompt a 36-per-cent increase in oilsands production.
The Pembina paper notes Western Canada’s pipeline capacity is tight, resulting in seriously depressed regional oil prices — a situation that has been labelled Alberta’s bitumen bubble.
“These low prices could ultimately threaten the commercial viability of oilsands products.”
Lemphers cites a CIBC World Markets prediction last September that existing pipeline capacity — at 3.7 million barrels per day — will be filled by 2016.
No pipelines. No market access. No profit. No new development.
In opposing Keystone XL, as well as two proposed pipeline projects through B.C., environmentalists believe they have found a means to shut down further oilsands investment.
They are touting the strategy in order to counter past claims by Keystone’s proponents that, regardless of whether the U.S. approves Keystone XL, the oilsands will be developed, with the product simply being directed to markets other than the U.S.
Not true, assert the activists. By getting pipelines rejected, one by one, they believe they can starve out the oilsands.
The oilsands accounts for five per cent of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions, and 0.1 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions.
Can the climate crusaders defeat Keystone XL?
It’s true, environmentalists make up a key constituency for the Democratic president. But, now beginning his second term, Obama no longer has to get himself reelected.
And the U.S. needs the economic spinoff from what would be one of its biggest construction projects in 2013. Besides, much of the pipeline is to be dedicated to moving product from the Americans’ own Bakken oilfields in Montana and North Dakota.
The stakes clearly are stunning, for both sides.
Original Article
Source: canada.com
Author: Barbara Yaffe
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