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The shovel-ready pipeline from Canada gets yet another clean bill of health as yet another State Department review says it will have negligible environmental impact, unlike the crude-carrying trains that are replacing it. President Obama promised in the State of the Union that 2014, his sixth year in office, would be a "year of action" on jobs, unlike the first five that saw the labor force participation rate sink to its lowest level in decades. In his weekly radio address on Jan. 18, he said he wanted "to work with Congress this year on proven ways to create jobs, like...

(CNSNews.com) - The U.S. State Department on Friday released yet another "final" environmental impact statement that finds no major objection to the Keystone XL pipeline So why won't President Obama approve the job-creating project that's been in limbo since 2008? White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough repeatedly dodged that question Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." "We have one department with a study," McDonough agreed. "Now we have other expert agencies -- the EPA and many others -- who have an -- the Energy Department -- an opportunity to look at this and make their determination. The president wants...

The final report largely echoed the conclusions in earlier reports that the pipeline would not affect greenhouse gas emissions. Pipeline opponents said they were now hanging their hopes on Mr. Kerry, who is expected to issue his conclusion on the pipeline in the coming months. An executive order signed by President George W. Bush gave the secretary of state the final say on cross-border pipeline projects. “I think the secretary has proven himself to be a lifelong advocate for tough action on climate, and we are cautiously confident that he will, along with the president, make the right decision,” said...

Ah, the elation that was felt yesterday when the headlines started showing up yesterday. The final report on the environmental impact of the proposed Keystone Pipeline was released, clearing the way for a speedy approval for construction from the White House. One of my coworkers read it out loud and declared it was about time. I pointed out that the favorable report was not the last word and was certainly not an approval to start construction of the pipeline, but my coworker said Obama would have no choice but to approve it. I told him simply, we shall see. I...

The State Department today released its long-awaited environmental impact analysis of the Keystone XL pipeline. The analysis is key because President Obama announced last summer he would not approve the pipeline unless it was found to have no significant impact on climate change. And that’s what the analysis finds. It argues, as many other analysts have concluded, that if we block the pipeline, Canada will just ship the oil out by rail. So, what public policy reason is there to block the pipeline? There really isn’t one. Indeed, the environmentalists' obsession with Keystone began as a gigantic mistake. Two and...

January 31, 2014, 03:09 pm Keystone pipeline clears hurdle By Laura Barron-Lopez The controversial Keystone XL pipeline cleared a major hurdle on Friday as the State Department ruled the project wouldnÂ’t significantly increase greenhouse gas emissions. The finding puts the pipeline one step closer to approval, and sets up a new battle between environmental groups and oil companies over whether the project is in the national interest. The Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the project reiterates key parts of a draft analysis released early last year, finding that oil sands extraction would continue regardless of whether the pipeline is built....

The State Department released a report on Friday that could pave the way toward President Obama’s approval of the Keystone XL oil pipeline. The long-awaited environmental impact statement on the project concludes that approval or denial of the pipeline, which would carry 830,000 barrels of oil a day from Alberta to the Gulf Coast, is unlikely to prompt oil companies to change the rate of their extraction of carbon-heavy tar sands oil, a State Department official said. Either way, the tar sands oil, which produces significantly more planet-warming carbon pollution than standard methods of drilling, is coming out of the...

Fixated as we Americans are on Canada’s three most attention-getting exports — polar vortexes, Alberta clippers and the antics of Toronto’s addled mayor — we’ve somewhat overlooked a major feature of Canada’s current relations with the United States: extreme annoyance. Last week, speaking to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Canada’s foreign minister calmly but pointedly complained that the United States owes Canada a response on the Keystone XL pipeline. “We can’t continue in this state of limbo,” he sort of complained, in what for a placid, imperturbable Canadian passes for an explosion of volcanic rage.

Among Washington's most important but rarely covered realities is the daily close coordination among Democratic politicians, executive branch bureaucrats and the left side of the non-profit activism community. Emails obtained recently through a Freedom of Information Act request submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency by the Energy and Environment Legal Institute exposed a slice of that coordination in the campaign to stop construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. The emails show, according to Fox News correspondent John Roberts, "senior policy officials at the EPA working closely with environmental groups in what appears to be an effort to kill the pipeline."...

There are new revelations in the fight to build the Keystone Pipeline. You remember Keystone? It's the project that would transport oil from Canada, south through several states, including Oklahoma, to refineries in Texas. It is guaranteed to create more than a few jobs and provide energy to North America. The Obama administration has fought it at every turn. They claim they are taking a deliberative approach, making sure all the environmental studies have been done, redone, examined, and reexamined. In other words, they have dragged their feet. We now know there is much more to this fight than Obama's...

Brushing aside pressure from Canada, Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday that the United States will not be pushed into making a decision on the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline. At a joint appearance with Canada's foreign affairs minister, John Baird, Kerry said he has not received a crucial environmental report on the $7 billion pipeline, which would carry oil from western Canada to refineries in Texas. "My hope is that before long, that analysis will be available, and then my work begins," Kerry said, referring to a recommendation he is expected to make on whether the pipeline is in...

Brushing aside pressure from Canada, Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday that the United States will not be pushed into making a decision on the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline. At a joint appearance with Canada’s foreign affairs minister, John Baird, Kerry said he has not received a crucial environmental report on the $7 billion pipeline, which would carry oil from western Canada to refineries in Texas. “My hope is that before long, that analysis will be available, and then my work begins,” Kerry said, referring to a recommendation he is expected to make on whether the pipeline is in...

Brushing aside pressure from Canada, Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday that the United States will not be pushed into making a decision on the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline. At a joint appearance with Canada's foreign affairs minister, John Baird, Kerry said he has not received a crucial environmental report on the $7 billion pipeline, which would carry oil from western Canada to refineries in Texas. "My hope is that before long, that analysis will be available, and then my work begins," Kerry said, referring to a recommendation he is expected to make on whether the pipeline is in...

At the end of 2013, after serving five years, Barack Obama is a complete failure as President, by his own standards, as reflected in his own words. How many times has President Obama told us that he is “fighting for the middle class”? But real median family income has been in a continuous downward spiral since he became President, actually falling more since the recession ended in the summer of 2009 according to the National Bureau of Economic Research than during the recession. That has added up by now to the middle class losing a month’s pay a year under...

HOUSTON — TransCanada has begun moving oil into the Keystone XL pipeline’s southern leg, which runs from Oklahoma to the Texas coast, a company spokesman said Monday. “TransCanada is pleased to confirm that at approximately 10:04 am Central Time on Saturday, December 7, 2013, the company began to inject oil into the Gulf Coast Project pipeline as it moves closer to the start of commercial service,” TransCanada spokesman Shawn Howard said in an email. The pipeline owner will need to fill the newly constructed line before it can begin delivering oil to refineries along the Gulf Coast, including those in...

At the last update, I think we were somewhere in “earlyish 2014″ territory (who can even keep up?) for the time frame in which the northern extension of the Keystone pipeline will be either approved or denied by President Obama, but by determinedly delaying on what should have/could have been a simple and bygone decision of his first term, the issue is now a ticking time bomb of highly publicized, faux-environmentalist outrageous outrage. I suppose that the dollars the president has been fundraising from well-monied, self-fancied “green” Democratic donors may have made the delay, delay, delay tactic worth it in...

An eyewitness noted when thirteen railroad tanker cars carrying propane and crude oil across Alberta, Canada exploded after derailing early on October 20th, "the fireball was so big, it shot across both lanes of the Yellowhead (Highway)... there's fire on both sides." Only two Canadian National Railway workers were injured and no deaths have been reported in this latest "pipeline on rails" calamity, but the horrific accident comes just 3 months after a similar oil train disaster in a populated area took 47 lives in Lac-Megantic, Quebec. It is too early to determine the cause of the latest accident, although...

Billionaire Warren Buffett tossed lifelines to a handful of blue-chip companies during the financial crisis. Five years later the payoff on those deals is becoming clear: $10 billion and counting. Mr. Buffett approached that figure after he collected another hefty payment last week, bringing to nearly 40% the pretax income on his crisis-era investments, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis.

CALGARY • An anti-Keystone XL pipeline commercial funded by President Barack Obama supporter and hedge-fund billionaire Tom Steyer confirms what many Canadians have long suspected — American anti-oil activists have gone mad. The commercial was intended to be aired Tuesday evening on WRC-TV, an affiliate of NBC in Washington, D.C., to coincide with the president’s appearance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno. The commercial is so offensive the station refused to air it. While intended as a parody, it insults TransCanada Corp. CEO Russ Girling, whose company is proposing Keystone XL; it’s a low blow to Canada; and it...

Full title: ‘Keystone oil will travel through America not to America’: Billionaire steps up anti-Keystone campaign with US$1M ad blitzThe author of the piece is with Bloomberg so it can not be posted on FR. However, the title says it all. Financial guru and billionaire Tom Steyer has re-invented himself as an anti-Keystone campaigner. He is sponsoring ads in a four-part, US$1 million advertising campaign to convince viewers the Keystone XL pipeline will hurt the economy and communities and should be blocked. Coincidentally (or not so) he is one of Obama's biggest campaign supporters and fund raiser. His activities aren't...