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The Senate upheld President Obama’s first veto of the new Congress on Wednesday, dooming for the foreseeable future any chance of constructing the Keystone XL pipeline that would bring oil from Canada to the U.S. The vote was seen as a key early test of Democrats’ willingness to defend their lame-duck party leader, and Mr. Obama passed that test easily, with the Senate falling four shy of the two-thirds supermajority needed to overturn the veto. “This is going to come back,” said Sen. Joe Manchin III, a West Virginia Democrat who did break with Mr. Obama and said eventually the...

The U.S. Senate voted down a key vote to override a White House veto on a bill to approve the contentious Keystone XL pipeline, which the GOP sees a key to job creation and maintaining a strong U.S. infrastructure. The vote on override a presidential veto failed 62-37. The Senate had passed the bill 62-36 in January.But last month President Obama vetoed the measure. Republicans have said that if they couldn't override Obama's veto, they plan to wrap legislation green-lighting the 1,700-mile pipeline into a spending measure or broader bill, such as the federal highway bill. But Democrats who oppose...

Kinder Morgan (KMI -0.6%) wants to drill through Burnaby Mountain in British Columbia to reach an oil-loading ship terminal, but WSJ reports that it is facing more challenges than the mountain itself, as it also is battling resistance from Vancouver officials and protestors opposed to fossil fuel development. Burnaby Mountain has become a symbolic battlefield in a much larger debate about energy resources in North America, opponents and supporters of the pipeline plan say. Canadian oil producers are counting on KMI’s $4.3B proposal to triple the capacity of the existing Trans Mountain pipeline, which connects Alberta’s oil sands to a...

Magellan Midstream Partners and Plains All American Pipeline are teaming up on a new $850 million, 550-mile pipeline to carry crude oil from Colorado to Cushing, Oklahoma. The new pipeline, called the Saddlehorn, will be built and owned by the Saddlehorn Pipeline Co., a 50-50 joint venture between the two companies. In an announcement Friday, Plains and Magellan said the new line has binding commitments from producers Noble Energy and Anadarko Petroleum Corp., and that Anadarko has an option to obtain a 20 percent stake in the venture. The line could be in service by mid-2016 if permitting and construction...

The Keystone XL pipeline got an emphatic endorsement Monday from a powerful backer of President Barack Obama who questioned the handling of the file. To billionaire investor Warren Buffett, the delay is a thumbing of the nose at Canada. "I would have passed Keystone," Buffett said in an interview with CNBC. "I think that we have an enormous interest in working with Canada, as they have in working with us. That oil is going to get sold. If we make it more difficult for them, who knows how they'll feel about making things more difficult for us someday." Because Buffett...

President Obama earned a double-barreled rebuke Monday from The Washington Post's fact-checker, for repeating a faulty claim that the Keystone XL pipeline "bypasses" the U.S. -- and for saying it would only carry "Canadian oil." The president made the claims in an interview last week with WDAY of Fargo, N.D. Obama continued to downplay the impact of the Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline, just days after vetoing a bipartisan-backed bill that would approve the construction project. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has teed up a vote to override that veto later this week. In the local interview, Obama said: "I've already...

In 2014, the World Bank Group committed $5 billion in new technical and financial support for energy projects in six African countries, including Kenya, which have partnered with US president Barack Obama’s Power Africa initiative. Among the projects funded, is the world's longest heated pipeline, which will bring newly discovered Ugandan oil fields to market. The Japanese conglomerate, Toyota, is the major contractor. Much of the oil, is committed to Asian markets, like China. On February 24, 2015 President Barack Obama, vetoed the Keystone XL pipeline, which would be a big boost to mid American and Canadian oil production. When...

The proposed Keystone XL pipeline has stirred considerable debate about the future of American energy policy. While the Senate’s recent vote to block its construction tables the discussion for the time being, it does not resolve major questions about how the U.S. transports oil today. With the ongoing shale gas boom, the U.S. is set to pass Saudi Arabia as the world’s top oil producer. Looking beyond KXL, such a rapid rise in production means American transportation networks are straining under new pressures to safely and efficiently move all this energy between different markets. The following figures show how Keystone...

President Obama vetoed legislation approving Keystone XL this afternoon, creating the latest and most significant challenge for the proposed 1,179-mile pipeline. “Through this bill, the United States Congress attempts to circumvent longstanding and proven processes for determining whether or not building and operating a cross-border pipeline serves the national interest,” the president wrote in his veto message. He added that “because this act of Congress conflicts with established executive procedures and cuts short thorough consideration of issues that could bear on our national interest — including our security, safety and environment — it has earned my veto.” It’s hard to...

One-hundred-fifty years ago, a man named Samuel Van Syckel built the nation's first commercial oil pipeline in the rugged terrain of northwestern Pennsylvania. His pipeline transformed how oil is transported — and it would change the modern world, too — but not before a battle that makes the debate over the Keystone XL pipeline look meek by comparison. In January 1865, the place where this all happened, called Pithole, was nowhere, really — just a patch of wilderness in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. Then drillers struck gushers at three wells and everything changed. By September, an estimated 15,000...

Legislation approving the controversial Keystone XL Pipeline has finally reached the presidentÂ’s desk. But donÂ’t celebrate just yet. In a joint op-ed published today in the pages of USA Today, House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) are urging Americans to begin tempering their hopes and expectations by accepting the inevitable: Tuesday, as promised, the new Congress is sending the White House legislation that would approve the Keystone XL pipeline. This project will support tens of thousands of American jobs. It will bolster the nation's infrastructure and energy security. And it enjoys a broad base...

President Barack Obama vetoed the Republicans’ Keystone XL pipeline bill Tuesday, rejecting Congress’ attempt to take the project’s fate out of his hands — and leaving the GOP prepared to attempt an override vote that will most likely fail.Obama’s veto message was delivered within hours of the legislation arriving on his desk. The White House had previously criticized lawmakers for trying to strip the executive branch’s authority over cross-border energy projects like the $8 billion Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline. Story Continued Below “I’m not shocked obviously,” Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said even before the widely expected...

Last month, a Nebraska Supreme Court decision approved a route for the proposed Keystone XL pipeline through the state. That decision effectively allowed TransCanada, the pipeline company, to begin issuing eminent domain papers to landowners in the way. But a fresh lawsuit brought by nearly 70 landowners has spurred a Nebraska judge to halt TransCanada’s eminent domain proceedings, the Huffington Post reported Thursday. “TransCanada sees the writing on the wall,” Jane Kleeb, director of Bold Nebraska, a group fighting the pipeline, said in a statement following the judge’s decision to issue an injunction. “Nebraska landowners are not going to cave...

As U.S. legislation to approve TransCanada Corp.’s Keystone XL pipeline waited Friday for a promised veto from U.S. President Barack Obama, the Calgary-based company said it would move ahead with another cross-border pipeline — this one to transport oil in the opposite direction. The $600-million, 460-kilometre Upland pipeline, first proposed in July 2014, has received the shipper support it requires to link multiple points in North Dakota to the proposed Energy East pipeline at Moosomin, Sask., TransCanada said Friday. The $12-billion Energy East pipeline would be an all-Canadian affair — an idea largely borne of frustrations with Washington’s interminable dithering...

Undaunted by the long battle over Keystone XL and current low oil prices, TransCanada Corp. is planning to build another border-crossing pipeline that would ferry North Dakota crude to refineries in Eastern Canada. TransCanada executives confirmed Friday they have signed contracts with shippers for enough capacity on the proposed 285-mile Upland pipeline to go forward with the project. It would move as many as 70,000 barrels a day of oil away from North Dakota’s Williston Basin, giving producers another alternative to shipping that crude by rail. “There is no question that production is up in North America, across the board,”...

Michigan Rep. Justin Amash was the sole Republican in the House to vote against the latest version of the bill advancing the Keystone XL Pipeline. Amash says he supports the construction of the pipeline, but he opposes legislation singling out one company. He has previously voted present on Keystone, but the addition of “new, unrelated sections empowering the EPA and the federal government with respect to local energy efficiency” pushed him to a no. In a statement published on his Facebook page, the tea party favorite said that the bill includes a lot of cronyism. Since 2013 he has argued...

The House voted Wednesday to approve legislation authorizing construction of the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline, setting up the first major veto of Obama's presidency. Passage fell largely along party lines in a 270-152 vote, with 29 Democrats joining all but one Republican, Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), in supporting the pipeline. The White House has repeatedly said President Obama will veto the legislation, and Republicans do not appear to have the two-thirds majority in either chamber to override him. The only mystery left is when and how Obama will announce the veto. It could be a tricky situation for the...

A week ago we explained that yet another conspiracy theory, one involving virtually every geopolitical hotzone, from Saudi Arabia, to Russia, the United States, Qatar, Syria, ISIS, and Ukraine, has become fact when our speculation from last September, namely that the plunge in oil was an choreographed move between the US and the Saudis (even if Kerry realized - we hope - that it meant a recession for the US energy producing states and a collapse in the only vibrant US industry of the past decade: shale), one seeking to dislodge Russian control over the Syrian government and to facilitate...

The U.S. Congress is nearing final approval of a bill that would green light the Keystone XL pipeline. But with the President set to veto the legislation when it reaches his desk, the ability of companies in Alberta to get their tar sands oil out of the country looks highly uncertain. With a southern route through Keystone XL potentially blocked, there have been alternative routes east and west. Enbridge has proposed the Northern Gateway pipeline, which would travel to British Columbia’s Pacific coast, but that has faced stiff environmental opposition from provincial residents and indigenous groups. TransCanada is also pushing...

Facing increased pressure from rail cutting into its business, while the Keystone XL pipeline remains under unending American review, TransCanada Corp. said it is planning to diversify into the oil-by-rail business within months, improving its customers’ ability to connect to its sprawling North American pipeline and storage network. “We are approaching 1.2 million barrels per day of [rail-] loading capacity — nobody has waited for Keystone XL pipeline to get built,” Russ Girling, president and CEO of the Calgary-based pipeline operator, said Wednesday following a speech to a business audience in Toronto. “Depending on our conversations [with customers], we will...