“State found that the oil sands will be developed even if the Keystone XL isn’t built.”
This is the key statement. They will continue to dig the sand out of the ground and then transport it somewhere else to process it into the end product. It will still end up producing energy somewhere else in the world. It will just cost more energy to get it to that place.
My question is why don’t the Canadian companies just build or expand another refinery in Canada to refine the product themselves? How many refineries are there in Alberta, BC, SK or MB? I know Federated Coop owns one somewhere north of Edmonton.
If Keystone is not built, the Canadians will lay pipe to Vancouver and ship the crude oil to China. Canada does not need us.
They would still have to deliver the product to the US. And the US is already refining more product than we use themselves.
This would only trade the problem of a crude oil pipeline with a refined products pipeline. And the US has a surplus of refined products. We do not have enough input to fill the refineries we already have.