By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts says President Joe Biden is off-base in his assessment of the Keystone XL oil pipeline and wrong to deny TC Energy a permit to build it.
The president followed the lead of President Barack Obama in denying a permit to build the pipeline designed to carry crude produced from the oil sands of western Canada to refineries in Texas, along the Gulf Coast.
Ricketts acknowledges he wasn’t surprised Biden reversed the approval granted the pipeline by President Donald Trump.
“This is something that is, again, is just going to be bad for the country. So, I’m not surprised,” Ricketts tells St. Joseph Post. “It’s disappointing to see the administration is really not going to be looking at the science around why this is important to do it or the economics about why it is important to do it and just go to political reasons.”
The $8 billion dollar, 1,200 mile oil pipeline would have extended from western Canada to Steele City, Nebraska. From there, it would have connected with the existing pipeline to travel to the oil refineries along the Gulf Coast in Texas. It is estimated it would carry more than 800,000 barrels of oil a day.
It needs a presidential permit, because it is crossing the northern border.
The pipeline has become a political lightening rod since TC Energy, TransCanada at the time, first proposed in 2008. Environmentalists have rallied against it, seeing it as a symbol of the county’s reliance on oil.
A State Department report on Keystone XL first found little to no environmental impact from the pipeline. The department reversed course later, recommending President Obama deny the request for a presidential permit. When Obama did decide against the project, he claimed approving it would have undercut the United States global leadership on climate change.
Trump approved it early in his presidency, but court battles, primarily in Nebraska, tied up the project and kept construction from proceeding.
Ricketts rejects Biden’s statement that the pipeline would not serve the national interest.
“It’s obviously not true,” Ricketts says. “It absolutely is in the U.S. national interest to be able to have energy independence in North America, to do business with one of our closest allies, Canada, to be able to get energy from them versus getting it from the Middle East or from Russia.”
Ricketts also disagrees with Biden’s assessment that Keystone XL would worsen greenhouse gases. Ricketts argues the crude produced from western Canadian oil sands will be transported somehow and if taken by truck or train, that would use more carbon than if through the pipeline.
Or, oil will be sought somewhere else.
“Because the oil will either be produced in Canada and shipped by a way that is going to create more greenhouse gases or it’s going to be created in countries that don’t have the same environmental regulations we do and that will create more greenhouse gases.”
Ricketts says cancellation of Keystone XL will cost Nebraska jobs. The governor estimates TC Energy would need between 1,000 to 2,700 construction workers with the pipeline needing 35-to-100 workers to maintain it once operational. It is estimated the pipeline would have produced $12 million in property tax revenue for local jurisdictions in Nebraska.
Even with all that is aligned against it after the Biden decision, Keystone XL isn’t dead, according to Ricketts.
“I don’t believe Keystone XL pipeline is dead,” Ricketts says. “I believe this administration is refusing to grant the permit. A future administration could change that. And, given our energy demand in this country, I think we’re going to continue to need things like the Keystone XL pipeline to be able to have an all of the above energy strategy to have energy independence here in North America.”