Obama Rejects Keystone XL Pipeline!

[Gardenarian]

Yay!
Maybe the tide is finally turning

[mschrisgo2]

Yes! and while I know it's good for the environment, I have a good friend in Canada who "works in oil" who is pretty sure she's going to lose her job. I wish somehow her company could transform into something more environmentally friendly, so she wouldn't lose her job.

[lessisbest]

My husband worked as an oiler on a crew setting pipelines in the summer after he was a senior in high school (his father was a crane operator); and what most people don't realize, there are pipelines all over the place! There's a veritable web of them crossing all over the U.S. There is nothing out of the ordinary about this one. I don't understand why this ONE pipeline has become so controversial? Or then, maybe I do..... Ignorance is supposed to be bliss, when it's really just ignorance.

[catherine]

My husband worked as an oiler on a crew setting pipelines in the summer after he was a senior in high school (his father was a crane operator); and what most people don't realize, there are pipelines all over the place! There's a veritable web of them crossing all over the U.S. There is nothing out of the ordinary about this one. I don't understand why this ONE pipeline has become so controversial? Or then, maybe I do..... Ignorance is supposed to be bliss, when it's really just ignorance.

It's controversial, not because it's just another existing pipeline, but because it represents ANOTHER NEW branch of the pipeline transporting an inferior fossil fuel, disrupting ecosystems, contaminating groundwater, and for no lasting benefit. A good portion of the tar sands that make it to our refineries will be exported, so it doesn't necessarily reduce our dependence on the Middle East. It will not guarantee jobs over the long term.

But it will take the pressure off of finding alternative energy sources that are less harmful to the planet.

[Lainey]

The "permanent" U.S. job number I read is 35. Only 35 jobs for environmental risk to one of our major natural water supplies, and the oil gets exported anyway. All downside, no upside for the U.S.

Took him years, but Obama finally made the right decision.

[freshstart]

The "permanent" U.S. job number I read is 35. Only 35 jobs for environmental risk to one of our major natural water supplies, and the oil gets exported anyway. All downside, no upside for the U.S.

Took him years, but Obama finally made the right decision.

AGREED

[Williamsmith]

Both sides made more of a situation about it than was necessary. It wasn't going to impact the environment much and it wasn't going to provide much in the way of an economic boost either. Obama made his mind up a long time ago. It was all choreographed. He got all the political juice out of it that he could squeeze. What's next?

[ApatheticNoMore]

It's controversial, not because it's just another existing pipeline, but because it represents ANOTHER NEW branch of the pipeline transporting an inferior fossil fuel

yes but other pipelines down from Canada can (and in fact ARE I believe but am not 100% sure) transporting tar sand fuel. Imagine you were driving down from Canada to Texas, I imagine many roads would get you there, some more direct of course - and so I propose that analogy, pipelines as roads - of course crude can also travel by rail etc. as well and may very well do so. Tarsands are already flowing THROUGH the Keystone XL south which was already built just not FROM the Keystone XL North which now is not being built I guess.

tarsands is flowing through the keystone xl south:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/05/...tone-xl-south/

disrupting ecosystems, contaminating groundwater, and for no lasting benefit.

I can accept it maybe saved some *local* ecosystems. I just have trouble accepting it has much impact on *global* climate change. That tarsands crude will be burnt, possibly it slows it down, or maybe not. So maybe it had as much effect as an ecosystem becoming a national park or national monument or something is closer to the truth, which does indeed protect that local forest from logging let's say (but meanwhile the whole planet burns up in forest fires etc. ....).

A good portion of the tar sands that make it to our refineries will be exported, so it doesn't necessarily reduce our dependence on the Middle East.

same for tarsands that make it down any other way

lessisbest is mostly correct as far as I can determine, yes an oil industry expert would know better, but they aren't necessarily on the side of saving anything remotely resembling a livable planet ... so ...

[ApatheticNoMore]

Both sides made more of a situation about it than was necessary. It wasn't going to impact the environment much and it wasn't going to provide much in the way of an economic boost either. Obama made his mind up a long time ago. It was all choreographed. He got all the political juice out of it that he could squeeze.

+1. Look if one just wants to argue out of smaller victories larger victories are built, I'm cool with that. And it's not a super small victory and people put their bodies on the line to prevent it as well (as they did with Keystone South, people physically tried to block it, but it was built anyway!). A community garden is a super small victory, it's bigger than that. It's just not as big a victory as it's been made out to be, which sigh, to some extent is a fundamental dishonesty ... I realize some are about "keep hope alive", but I'm about are we honest at the end of the day maybe ... I don't know.

[lessisbest]

We have solar heat and part of our energy source is from solar-powered batteries. How many of you "Kill the Keystone Pipeline" crowd use solar?

Meanwhile, Warren Buffett had the best ever quarterly profit - climbing to a record $9.43 billion. In part, thanks to Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad that hauls what the Keystone Pipeline was supposed to deliver - (which is also the 2nd biggest rail system) came up with a 12% increase. Crony WHAT!