OBAMA’S “ALL OF THE ABOVE” ENERGY POLICY IS MISSING SOMETHING
By William Schachte || President Obama’s State of the Union address was nearly 7,000 words long. He talked a lot, in general terms, about getting people back to work and devoted almost 500 words to the subject of energy, but not once did he mention the Keystone XL pipeline.
I find this very odd, because Canadian oil transported safely to the United States through the Keystone XL pipeline could be a major component in the president’s self-styled “all-of-the-above” strategy for energy development, if only he would approve it.
Construction of the pipeline could be a major component in the president’s self-avowed effort to get people back to work, if only he would approve it.
Transportation of Canadian oil by pipeline rather than by road, rail, or sea would also reduce greenhouse gas emissions and lessen the likelihood that our nation’s troops will be put in harm’s way trying to protect our access to unreliable foreign sources of oil. These, too, are goals that the president professes to support and could advance, if only he would approve the pipeline.
The president proposed a “year of action” in which he will forge ahead “wherever and whenever I can take steps without legislation.”
That, of course, has not been his approach with the Keystone XL pipeline, which has been approved by everyone but him. We’ve been waiting for his approval of this pipeline for more than five years now. It’s been subjected to four environmental impact statements. It’s been approved by all the states it crosses, by the Environmental Protection Agency and by the State Department. It has the approval of the majority of Congress (including all but one of our state’s congressional delegation) and two thirds of the American people.
The only one who hasn’t approved it, after years of inaction, is the president, who could have taken the necessary steps, wherever and whenever he wanted to, without legislation. Two thirds of the pipeline has already been completed. The connecting piece, the missing third, is Keystone, the part that crosses our border with Canada.
The United States is in the midst of an energy renaissance, with vast new reserves of oil and gas being discovered and new safe techniques like hydraulic fracturing allowing us to tap previously inaccessible reserves.
Unprecedented domestic production and increased imports from Canada could make the United States energy independent by 2015.
National security and energy security go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other. Canada, one of our oldest and most trusted allies, already supplies a significant portion of the oil we import. Keystone would raise that intake by 830,000 barrels per day.
That means more oil from a reliable friend, less from unstable or hostile nations like oil-rich Venezuela — who would be the big winner if Keystone isn’t approved — or the revolution-racked countries of the Middle East. It also means a big increase in the energy security on which our national security depends.
Construction and maintenance of Keystone will be a boon for our economy, too, creating thousands of jobs, adding billions to our GDP, increasing government revenues, and improving our national trade deficit (Canadians buy almost as much from us as we do from them).
President Obama says he believes in an all-of-the-above strategy to energy development, but his “all of the above” consistently leaves out “one of the above”: Keystone.
The Keystone XL pipeline doesn’t require legislation, Mr. President. All it needs is your approval.
William Schachte is a retired Navy rear admiral who resides in Charleston, S.C.
79 comments
Middle Eastern sheiks are probably bribing Administration officials to spike the pipe….
Not surprisingly, more probably Warren Buffet. Not only has this already been suggested, he directly benefits from the non-existence of the pipe line via his recent investments in rail(last 5 years) that are filling oil transport orders.
Buffet has become a crony capitalist in his old age. I’ve heard some say it’s payback for the 08′ bank bailouts when he ran cover for the Feds to stuff banks full of digital money to keep them afloat.(which also incidentally protected Buffet’s investments too)
“increased imports from Canada could make the United States energy independent by 2015” this is an odd notion that is all over political media these days. certainly canadian oil is more reliable and “friendly”. but unless we’re planning to pull a crimea on alberta, it won’t make us independent.
Goobers don’t know complicated words like “fungible.”
I can’t *wait* for the first spill to poison the continental aquifer! Let’s get this bitch on line so we can have more Republican shit to clean up.
It’s my understanding the oil would only be used for export, not for U.S. consumers. Am I missing something here??
Independent by 2015?? Pass me some of that shit, Admiral!
Winner, winner, chicken dinner!! China to be exact!
You know that’s a lie and you still use it. Even after I went through all the trouble to explain it to you and answer your questions.
OPEC shills like you make me sick.
yes you are.
Oil is not “used here or there” – it’s fungible. The cost of oil is not dependent on where it’s pumped.
Then why export it or transport it. Build a refinery in Canada or Nebraska.
Refineries are expensive, and there are environmental protections even in Canada and Nebraska. It’s cheaper to pipe it to an existing refinery.
It’s alllll about the money – fuck the continental aquifer, farm land, hunting land, parks, towns…
Just give me my fucking *money*!
Hey Dipshit Admiral!! The oil is going to be exported to China.
My dear, dear, dear fellow fitsnews readers…..? Do you really not understand why this article is being penned by this Admiral and submitted to Fitsnews. Certain points this Admiral makes are true. Now consider this, if you will, why would this Admiral spend this time to send this article to Fits instead of just getting himself back up to Washington and getting a little face time with Senator Graham and Scott and Rep Clyburn to schedule a meeting with President Obama instead..?
Considering that all warfare is based upon deception, then how is this article being used to leverage deception for who..? Heck, does anyone feel this Admiral cares what anyone here says if they do not use their REAL NAMES to make a comment.
This Admiral is not STUPID………he knows how to outflank orders to meet his needs. The question is…….do readers here understand how to use this Admiral to meet the needs of “Fitsnews”…!?
This Admiral can smell the Keystone Pipeline “flowers” all he wants to…(just like Ferdinand the Bull)…!! The deceptive note of ploy should ask if this Admiral understands how the Keystone Pipeline is like the Gazprom Pipelines in Ukraine..!?
How would this Admiral track pipeline oil revenues in Nebraska to compare how Gazprom tracked oil transit revenues through the Ukraine. If students at the University of Nebraska really understood how Keystone bribes (donations) flowed; we wonder how this Admiral would protect his “oil fleet”..!?!
We wonder if Wil Folks will be riding shotgun with this Admiral the next time he comes to SPAWAR Atlantic…!? Ya know, to report some facts….!!!
He’s a Rear Admiral. Just like Lindsey.
zing!
He is (or was) a damn lobbyist. Wonder which one of his clients Keystone serves…
http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/lobbyist.php?id=Y0000041918L&year=2004
https://www.blankrome.com/index.cfm?contentID=10&bioID=8112
A bought and paid for whore.
Jesus Christ, how many times does it have to be said?
Keystone XL will transport tar sands to refineries to be processed and then sold overseas.
It WILL NOT reduce our dependence on foreign oil.
It WILL NOT reduce the price of gas.
What it DOES do is put a significant risk to Americans, especially those living near the pipeline who could likely see their water supply poisoned by a pipe leak. How often do leaks happen?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pipeline_accidents_in_the_United_States_in_the_21st_century
And with how Deepwater Horizon has gone, as well as other oil pipeline leaks, as well as non-oil leakages like in West Virginia or in North Carolina, the general public will assume all of the risk and consequences while corporations will assume all of the benefits (i.e. profits) and go unpunished when shit inevitably hits the fan.
Last I heard, they’re still using the same well heads that caused the spill the first time, and have not significantly improved their plan to quickly deal with another spill… and haven’t paid off their 20 bn to the shrimpers or sea food industry.
Get a grip, Smirks. Oil transported by pipeline results in many times less volume of spills than the alternatives of rail and truck. Kinda like the safety difference between traveling by air and car. Also surface spills (from rail, truck, or pipeline) don’t reach the depths of the Ogallalah Auquifer and are easily filtered out. Inconvienient facts but still facts. Keystone is safer than the alternatives. Period.
measured in tonnes of crude oil with one tonne roughly equal to 308 US gallons, or 7.33 barrels since 2000 to many oil spills to list here. follow link and you will be amazed.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pipeline_accidents_in_the_United_States_in_the_21st_century
Get a grip, Inciteful.
Nobody is going to transport these Canadian bitumen from Alberta to the Gulf by truck. And in fact very little will go by train too, simply because rail transport of bitumen is some $10-$20/barrel more expensive than pipeline transport.
And at that difference in transport cost, there is no need for increased volume transport, since new tar sand projects in Alberta are no longer profitable.
ERM (the industry contractor that wrote the State Department report) was remarkably vague about the cost of rail versus pipeline (in fact they completely obfuscate the issue with ambiguous statements and no calculations at all) but luckily CarbonTracker did the math for them.
http://www.carbontracker.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Kxl-The-Significance-Trap_FINAL_03_03_2014.pdf
Showing that in fact, rail is not an alternative for Canadian tar sand developers.
The State Department report cover the rail option very well, it even had maps of all the new rail loading and offloading terminals that have and are being built.
You keep saying the trains would have to go to the gulf and that just isn’t true. the trains only have to go to Steele City NE.
You like these maps, right ? They sure look so nice.
Now about the beef :
Where in the State Department report do they mention the cost of rail transport and compare it to pipeline transport ?
Didn’t you even read it ?
Go read it
I did. It’s not there, Killian.
Yea they put the maps of the added rail terminals and then said nothing about them. You know not everyone is as stupid as you.
It’s still not there, Killian.
The sky is falling, the sky is falling, another pipeline the sky is falling.
Sounds familiar,
My mother asked to have “I told you I was sick” put on her gravestone.
Yep both the left and right know how to do it.
The shame is, when the sky actually falls, the Republicans run under the stove, and only come out when they think they can start taking out the supports again.
If you say so, every thing on the internet is true.
I’m JAFO.
Can’t be not with all your responses.
I’m the latest model.
I never thought I’d say it but articles like this are making me long for Howard Rich (gulp!) . . .
Swiftboat Schachte will say what you pay him too.
It really is this simple. Berkshire-Hathaway bought the Santa Fe-Burlington Northern railroads in 2009 for 30-some billion dollars. The delay in the KS-XL Pipeline puts the oil in rail cars. Warren Buffet has been a significant donor for Obama in particular and the DNC in general. Warren Buffet owns the rail cars. Obama is the President.
What we need is for Congress to rescind the natural gas export ban and open up the gas fields off the Carolina coastlines. Second, we have the worlds largest proven oil reserves waiting to be connected to the KS-XL Pipeline. In the fullness of time the USA can be oil independent while crushing the price of oil utterly smashing Russia’s military buildup. Soon is my guess.
“completely destroying the BRICS alliance’s plan to replace the “petrodollar”.
I’m kinda rooting for the BRICS to do it so our masters have to play just a pinch fairer…the boot of monetization isn’t just on thier necks, it’s on ours too as well as our future generations.
“The delay in the KS-XL Pipeline puts the oil in rail cars. ”
Actually it does not.
Only a meager 50,000 bpd of Canadian bitumen is transported by rail.
And it is unlikely that rail transport will get anywhere close to the 830,000 bpd Keystone XL capacity, since new tar sand projects are no longer profitable under increased transportation costs of rail.
“Everything about this project, and I mean EVERYTHING, is wrong.”
Read no more than this and reviewed your profile for the Headlines you comment on and it’s obvious you’re a troll.
I’ve been called worse than that.
There is still no evidence that “The delay in the KS-XL Pipeline puts the oil in rail cars. “
Verific is an OPEC sponsored troll.
I’ve been called worse than that too.
And still no evidence that “The delay in the KS-XL Pipeline puts the oil in rail cars. “
It already has stupid.
Sorry but what you posted is just not true. over 100,000 barrels are now being transported by rail and more loading terminals are being built. Because the tar sands are still economical to produce even transporting by rail.
You need to get some new talking points from your OPEC bosses.
Killian, that 100,000 by rail is for all types of Canadian crude railed in all directions. Not just bitumen and not just running south.
And in fact it seems that crude oil EXPORT to Canada (mostly by rail from our very own Bakken), running in OPPOSITE direction from the Keystone XL is increasing faster than your bitumen coming south by rail, topping 200,000 bpd lately :
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MCREXCA2&f=M
Maybe these trains going north into Canada with our nice sweet, light domestic crude need to be careful not to run into your trains going south with Canadian tar sand sludge.
You need to get some new talking points from your billionaire tar sand bosses.
Schachte said “Construction of the pipeline could be a major component in the president’s self-avowed effort to get people back to work, if only he would approve it.”
You mean all 35 permanent jobs that ERM (State Department) estimates for the Keystone XL ?
We have a green troll.
It does not matter if I’m orange, red, blue, green or purple or a troll or not.
“We” have 35 permanent jobs for the Keystone XL.
And that’s it.
Schachte said “Transportation of Canadian oil by pipeline rather than by road, rail, or sea would also reduce greenhouse gas emissions”
And how does that compare to the 1 Gton increase in greenhouse gas emissions over other crudes if this project is approved ?
Trolling, trolling, trolling down the pipeline.
dreaming, dreaming, dreaming down the pipeline with your head stuck in the tar sands.
Keystone XL still would emit 1 Gton greenhouse gasses over other crudes, even using the biased industry estimates from ERM.
Now what ?
i don’t care you don’t matter…too easy to play.
Schachte said : “and lessen the likelihood that our nation’s troops will be put in harm’s way trying to protect our access to unreliable foreign sources of oil.”
Considering that the US currently already exports more refined products than we import from all OPEC countries combined, that argument no longer holds.
We are already independent from OPEC and only the billionaire US refinery owners will benefit from new imports via the Keystone XL.
Troll much.
Are you ?
Seriously, idcydm,
Why would we want to import 830,000 bpd of the most polluting, most carbon heavy bitumen (not even oil) when we are exporting more than we import from all OPEC nations combined ?
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MTTEXUS2&f=M
Bill Schachte doesn’t do (or write) anything unless there’s big money in it for him.
He became a multi-millionaire as co-owner of Charleston International Ports LLC at the former Charleston Navy Base after recommending — to Hunley Commission Chairman Glenn McConnell — his CIP co-owner Warren F. Lasch, a convicted federal criminal, to become “private fund raiser” for McConnell’s “Friends of the Hunley, Inc.”
Upshot: Lasch and Schachte got fabulously rich from the shipping terminal (owned by the SC Ports Authority); Lasch raised little money; Hunley project went into the red; McConnell — with Schachte’s help — forced Clemson to bail out Hunley project; and SP Ports Authority sued/evicted Lasch/Schachte’s company CIP.
Count your silverware before and after Schachte pays you a visit.
Everything about this project, and I mean EVERYTHING, is wrong.
The jobs numbers advertised in the US media (10’s of thousands, 100’s of thousands, or even up to a million (Rick Perry) jobs) turned out to be pure industry propaganda, and in fact only 3,900 man-years may be created (1,950 jobs for two years) in special work camps in Montana, South Dakota and Nebraska.
The media argument that Keystone XL would be adding to “US energy independence” turned out to be false.
For starters, it is a head scratcher how a pipeline that IMPORTS oil can add to our domestic energy independence, but short of that, in fact, the Gulf refineries are already exporting more refined products than they are importing from all OPEC countries combined.
The GHG emission numbers of the tar sand crude running through this was underestimated (ERM’s 17 % turns out to be 40 % over US average crude, which means half a barrel of crude energy (in the form of natural gas) is burned even before a barrel of crude gets to your tank.
A foreign corporation is using “eminent domain” rights to claim US land, apparently a first in US history, and challenged in court.
The 830,000 bpd blended Canadian bitumen running through this pipe will result in an additional 500,000 ton/day in toxic waste water to be pumped into unlined tailing ponds which leak toxins into the Athabasca river delta, which we already know kill wildlife and increase cancer rates in down stream First Native communities.
Should I go on ?
Who pays you, you’re nothing but a troll.
You can’t refute a single fact I mentioned, can you, idcydm ?
Let me guess, you are retired and are stuck in your opinions, and when confronted with facts you don’t like you discard them.
And you are unable to quantify any reason why the Keystone XL would be good for our nation.
I thought so.
And no. I’m not paid. I’m just a down-to-Earth guy who is not convinced by the industry propaganda in our media and posts the facts about this project.
What’s the HOLD UP?…OBAMA…
Obama’s the hold up t freedom, prosperity, opportunity, jobs, and the pursuit of happiness, except for his…
You idiot. Why don’t you link us to what this great fucking pipeline will do for us energy wise?? Otherwise, you’re just a damn fool…One fucking link that tells me this is a good idea, and I’ll eat my fucking hat.
I KNOW what your lord-god Obama is DOING is NOT working…
And when you REFUSE to use your unlimited Resources, the ones who are smart enough to sell theirs…can charge what they want..and Obama does not give a $#!* how much damage that does to Americans…because he told us he would extract REVENGE…
Lol…so the answer is “Golly, I don’t know, but I’ll try and bullshit my way through it…” Thanks, Dumbass.
So many Lie’s and untruth’s. For one the pipe line has not been approved by Nebraskan State Citizen’s. The big oil suits are trying to buy off financially strapped land owners and make them responsible for any clean up that would be needed for the eventual oil spill. If there’s so much money to be made why don’t they pipe it to there side of the Great Lakes an ship it to a refinery? Because the Canadian Providences will not let them because of environment reason’s.
It’s the most toxic oil to transport, What happens to the sand once it gets to the refinery? After being separated from the oil, the toxic sands resembles sticky tar clumps and piled into pits hundreds of acres in diameter. Eventually ship to third world Country’s as Ballast for ships and sold as cooking fuel, to people who cook there meals on dirt floors, and breath in all the toxic goodness.
Just though you should know the TRUTH.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pipeline_accidents_in_the_United_States_in_the_21st_century
follow this link to see how safe oil pipe lines really are.
CINCINNATI (AP) — Federal environmental officials now estimate more than 20,000 gallons of crude oil — double the initial estimates — leaked from a pipeline into a nature preserve in southwest Ohio.
What administration do these catastrophe-claiming FEDERAL environmental “officials” work for???
Remember: they told us the Gulf would not be cleaned up in 100 years…what a BIG F*#king Lie that was. It took a year or less…So I imagine these people are lying to cover their ignorance, here, too..Don’t you?
PS: They also are the geniuses who give us GLOBAL WARMING…the biggest Hoax of the Century…
The “national interest” of the US is now officially redefined as the “industry interest” of a few billionaire refinery owners and tar sand developers and physics, science and facts are a the biggest hoax of the Century.
It all makes sense now…
So you’re claiming Global Warming is based in sound, honest science???…and it’s being rejected only because energy producers are dis-crediting Global Warming promoters???
Yes, GrandTango. Global Warming is based on physics, and sound and honest science.
CO2 and other GHGs warm our planet.
Nothing you can change about that.
As for the “dis-crediting” part, yes, there are many high profile (incidentally all Republican) political figures that deny the science of Global Warming, and even some that call it a hoax.
It appears that you have been persuaded by their words.
Maybe you found it plausible, or maybe you found it convenient, to agree with these politicians because they agree with your beliefs.
Or maybe you are simply a free-lance PR working for the fossil fuel industry.
Who knows ?
Either way, words do not change the physics of Global Warming. As Feynman used to say : “Nature cannot be fooled”.
Not even by a thousand freelance fossil fuel PR agents.
You F*#King KOOK….Ted Danson Told us we’d be totally fried by now because of Global Warming…but none of your predictions have even come close to coming true….The models you based all of your dogma on were forged and East Anglia was caught outright lying…Admitting they were trying to start a movement, but there is not data to support it…
You’re just a Dumb@$$….
Forgot your meds today ?
Schachte is a high-paid hussie who uses his admiral uniform picture to project an air of respectability, integrity, and honesty. He’d sell swampland as high ground and used shoes as new to his own family if the price was right.
The Admiral didn’t get the memo: The DOD sees climate change as a major threat to national Security.
Military Leaders Respond to Secretary Hagel Speech
…http://climateandsecurity.org/2013/11/22/military-leaders-respond-to-secretary-hagel-speech-climate-change-threat-to-national-security/
There are many other good reasons to say “no” to Keystone. It will not create the jobs claimed* for it, nor will it reduce prices at the pump. In fact, prices may go up as domestic oil finds easier ways overseas.
And we can see it threatens water supplies in measures that would make the BP spill seem mild.
But most importantly, the IEA estimates that Keystone would harvest 3 times the carbon that would take us over 2 degrees C, the absolute limit for a catastrophe we might survive, if we’re lucky.
See: “IEA acknowledges fossil fuel reserves climate crunch”
http://priceofoil.org/2012/11/…
We are warned of this climate abyss by our most trusted messengers, such as NOAA, NASA, the Royal Academy of UK (SIr Isaac Newton was president), National Academy of Sciences (Einstein was a member) the very conservative World Bank, National Geographic, Scientific American, the IMF.
We are told of current disastrous health effects by the ?American Academy of Pediatrics, World Health Organization and the AMA.
We cannot rely on State Department assessments, if made by employees of the carbon industries.??
And Keystone would eventually strip forests the size of Florida, forests that might have absorbed enormous quantities of CO2 before they were removed as “overburden”.
Would Keystone “replace” those forests? They say they would repair any? damage, right? Laughable.
Even 2 degrees itself may be too high – a “prescription for disaster”?says Dr. James Hansen, chief climatologist at NASA (ret.), one who, early on, predicted many of the catastrophic effects that we have seen.
Many of us know the bitter taste of the weird weather out there, with just current warming of .8 deg C. Shall we roll the dice for our kids and grand kids, saying “let it ride!” beyond 2 degrees and more? More, and we might invite abrupt, irreversible changes.
No, taking your kids to to Disney World does not make up for that.
With its high risks and low return, Keystone XL is not a smart gamble.
*jobs http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/globallaborinstitute/research/keystonexl.html
A recent State Dept. study said the construction workforce would be 5,000 to 6,000 workers. And once the construction phase ends, almost all of these jobs, however many are created, would go away.