[thackney]

Future incremental (increased) production, the delta, of U.S. supply and demand will be small, relative to increases in supply from countries like Russia

I do not believe that is true. For 2013 Russia production growth is expected to rather small compared to the US. In 2014 they are expected to fall in production rate while the US will have significant production growth.

As such, increases in U.S. production will not have a significant impact on world oil prices.

The US is having the largest production increases in the world.

[Praxeologue]

Decisions on big-cap items like pipelines need to be made based on a best estimate of demand a decade or so out, not next year. For example, Canadian oil sands production is forecast to grow from 1.8 million barrels per day in 2012 to 5.2 million barrels per day in 2030: http://www.capp.ca/getdoc.aspx?DocId=227308&DT=NTV Long-term, Canada will do better finding its own refinery solution.