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Cross-Posted from DeSmogBlog
The Tar Sands Blockade of TransCanada Corporation’s “Keystone XL South” continues in Texas, but former members of the Clinton and George W. Bush cabinets believe the northern half will soon be green-lighted by President Barack Obama.
In a Nov. 13 conference call led by the Consumer Energy Alliance (CEA), an oil and gas industry front group, CEA Counsel John Northington said he believes a “Keystone XL North” rubber stamp is in the works by the Obama Administration.
“I think the Keystone will be approved in fairly short order by the administration,” Northington said on the call.
Northington has worn many hats during his long career:
[He] served in the Clinton Administration at the Department of the Interior as Senior Advisor to the Director of the Bureau of Land Management. Mr. Northington also served as Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management with energy policy responsibility for the former Minerals Management Service and the Bureau of Land Management. Mr. Northington began his government service at the Department of Energy, where he served as White House Liaison, Chief of Staff for the Office of Fossil Energy and Senior Advisor for Oil and Natural Gas Policy.
After his tenure working for the Clinton Administration, he walked through the revolving door and became a lobbyist, representing many clients over the past decade, including the oil and gas industry. Northington has represented ExxonMobil, Devon Energy, CONSOL Energy, and Statoil. ExxonMobil, Devon and Statoil all have a major stake in the tar sands.
Northington was joined on the call by Michael Whatley, CEA’s Executive Vice President. Whatley seved as senior policy advisor for the Bush-Cheney 2000 campaign, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Department of Energy under George W. Bush and as Chief of Staff of former Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-NC).
CEA fronts for HBW Resources, a lobbying firm run by David Holt, Andrew Browning and Whatley (hence the “HBW”), with a developed speciality of lobbying on behalf of the tar sands industry.
Whatley, above and beyond working for the Bush Administration, Sen. Dole and CEA, has also lobbied on behalf ofExxonMobil and General Electric (GE). GE, like ExxonMobil, also has a fiscal present and future interest in tar sands production.
Win, Win for Some; Lose, Lose for Most: Tar Sands With Or Without Keystone XL
Though outfits like CEA are working overtime to ensure “Keystone XL North” is built soon, there are other ways to skin the cat and bring tar sands crude to market. The most important one, covered here on DeSmogBlog and in a recent story published by the Calgary Herald, is freight rail.
Warren Buffett, the “Oracle of Obama,” has a major financial stake both in tar sands production, as well as in moving tar sands to market via the Burlington Northern Sante Fe (BNSF) freight trains he owns under the auspices of his holding company, Berkshire Hathaway.
Buffett gave over $60,000 to the Democratic National Committee during the 2012 election cycle, as well as another $70,000 to President-elect Barack Obama, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings.
“Railroads too present environmental issues. Moving crude on trains produces more global warming gases than a pipeline,” explained Bloomberg in January 2012.
BNSF isn’t the only rail company eager to move tar sands crude to market. Southern Pacific also envisions a major market opening for freight rail transport. A recent Calgary Herald story explains,
While Canadian and U.S. railways are scrambling to meet demand, opening small terminals close to production in locations such as the Bakken area of southern Saskatchewan and North Dakota, the Athabasca oilsands have not been part of the rush. Until now….Unlike pipelines, that means no public hearings and no environmental protests.
The verdict is in.
Chock it up to yet another win-win for the oil and gas industry and a lose-lose for all who have to suffer the consequences of the ecological damage in Alberta, as well as the climate change amplified disasters it’s engendering around the world.
14 Comments
Thank you for this info, we are screwed. Qu’elle surprise.
Thanks.
The effective evil Barrack Obama is presiding over pulling the final rivets holding the wings onto the airplane.
If there was one tree left in the world, Obama would chop it down, if it made him some money.
Not so clear the pipeline will pass the profitability test. Tar sands oil is not competitive with the Bakken Field shale oil. There are soe signs of oil companies in Alberta cutting back development because of falling crude prices.
Wonder if we can get all the veal pen folks to hold their breath until the closet liberal they expect O to be materializes. I’d laugh but this crap is not funny.
is anybody really surprised by this? You had to know that keystone would be green-lighted as soon as the election was over regardless of who won.
I’m old enough to remember when some people supported Obama over Hillary in the primaries because they thought a Hillary administration would be filled with retreads from Bill’s presidency.
No, no one is surprised, it was always just a question how he would sequence, and how fast, his pro-corp actions on all the deferred-until-after-election issues (XL, TPA, cut SMM, etc.).
But of course. No surprise here. Global Warming be damned the U.S. is going to drill it’s way to energy independence. It’s only the “little” people that will suffer the consequences of global climate change.
Mammon rules….
Note that today Bill McKibben is in Washington DC with his Do The Math tour. Perhaps these confident statements are just that–a con job to get out in front of the Keystone issue. It’s not over til it’s over. Let’s keep fighting this rather than throwing up our hands and accepting defeat. There’s too much to do.
Hey, the Ogallala Aquifer is going to be totally drained soon anyway, to water that Monsanto corn, so we might as well not worry about it. /s
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/ogallala-aquifer-6531527
Agreed. I caught that on UP with Chris Hayes too. There just isn’t time to wring hands and cry woe is us. We gotta make Obama pay for whatever he does or does not do.
I thought we were supposed to thank OBomba for delaying it; I know I wrote him a nice letter. Maybe y’all forgot, and this is his revenge?