Daryl Hannah - Why I'm Standing Up to TransCanada's Keystone XL Pipeline in East Texas

On 4 October 2012, in rural east Texas, a 78-year-old great-grandmother, Eleanor Fairchild, was arrested for trespassing on her own property … and I was arrested standing beside her, as we held our ground in the path of earth-moving excavators constructing TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline.

Seems there's showdown in Texas – but, in fact, it's a battle being waged all over the United States. It's being fought by ordinary citizens of all colors, economic strata and political persuasions – against the world's wealthiest multinational corporations, misinformation and deeply embedded fears. While I'm not a fan of war terminology, in these struggles, war analogies seem to highlight both the crisis at hand and perhaps the solution we seek.

Let's face it, we are in times of great crisis: economic crisis, overpopulation crisis,< climate crisis, extinction crisis, water crisis and a humanitarian crisis on so many levels. Energy, and how we create it, is a pivotal issue for many of these crises. It has become increasingly clear that we need to move in a different direction, yet as a species, we humans are uncomfortable with, and resist, change – though we know it is the very nature of life and not only essential, but inevitable.

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/17-6

Action Alert: The Rockaway Pipeline

The Rockaway Lateral is yet another high-pressure, large-diameter gas pipeline, proposed to run across newly restoredwetlands in Jamaica Bay, under Riis Park beach, Floyd Bennett Field, all the way to Avenue U, near the always-crowded Kings Plaza shopping center in Brooklyn. 

All the same problems with fracking and radon that apply to the Spectra pipeline also apply to the Rockaway Lateral––and more: grave risks to delicate wetlands as well as risks from frequent brush fires at Floyd Bennett field. And the safety record of this pipeline builder (Williams Transco) is just as bad as Spectra's. In fact, since 2008, there's been only one month out of the past 45 in which they have not operated under a federal Corrective Action Order. Just this past March, they were fined $50,000 for failures related to corrosion control on pipes running through Staten Island.

Comments Due by Monday, 5pm, June 25, 2012!

Public comments are needed by 5pm June 25th. It's easy to e-comment on the FERC website. Reference Docket No. PF09-8-000. In a rush? Cut and paste from this sample comment.

A New York Strangled by Pipelines?

This pipeline is another piece of the pie in Mayor Bloomberg's plan to convert all of NYC to methane. Lawmakers are buying into the false promise of cleaner skies via boiler conversions, and ignoring the health risks from air pollution, water contamination and radon that come with use of fracked gas. Even uber-liberal Congressional leaders and Senators have been unabashedly supportive of this shale gas takeover.  Did you even HEAR about the Congressional ok for this pipeline? It snuck through Congress in February, and is now up for grabs in the Senate. Watch this clip from "Inside City Hall" for some background. Schumer and Gillibrand have been tough nuts to crack on this issue, but we urge you to communicate your opposition to this plan. We want a New York run on clean energy--wind, water and solar--not on polluting shale gas!

Read More:

http://saneenergyproject.org/events/

Bill McKibben - Too Hot Not to Notice?

The Williams River was so languid and lovely last Saturday morning that it was almost impossible to imagine the violence with which it must have been running on August 28, 2011. And yet the evidence was all around: sand piled high on its banks, trees still scattered as if by a giant’s fist, and most obvious of all, a utilitarian temporary bridge where for 140 years a graceful covered bridge had spanned the water.

The YouTube video of that bridge crashing into the raging river was Vermont’s iconic image from its worst disaster in memory, the record flooding that followed Hurricane Irene’s rampage through the state in August 2011.  It claimed dozens of lives, as it cut more than a billion-dollar swath of destruction across the eastern United States.

I watched it on TV in Washington just after emerging from jail, having been arrested at the White House during mass protests of the Keystone XL pipeline.  Since Vermont’s my home, it took the theoretical -- the ever more turbulent, erratic, and dangerous weather that the tar sands pipeline from Canada would help ensure -- and made it all too concrete. It shook me bad.

And I’m not the only one.

New data released last month by researchers at Yale and George Mason universities show that a lot of Americans are growing far more concerned about climate change, precisely because they’re drawing the links between freaky weather, a climate kicked off-kilter by a fossil-fuel guzzling civilization, and their own lives. After a year with a record number of multi-billion dollar weather disasters, seven in ten Americans now believe that “global warming is affecting the weather.” No less striking, 35% of the respondents reported that extreme weather had affected them personally in 2011.  As Yale’s Anthony Laiserowitz told the New York Times, “People are starting to connect the dots.”

Read More:

http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175537/

Tar sands oil heading east? Controversial crude could make its way to New England via pipeline

The Keystone XL pipeline extension, which would transport an oil product known as "tar sands" to refineries on the Gulf Coast, has received a wealth of media attention this year.

However, the Keystone XL pipeline isn't the only transportation path for tar sands oil. Oil suppliers have explored a number of ways to move the controversial petroleum product to market, including pathways through the Northeast.

One of Canada's largest pipeline operators, Enbridge, Inc., developed a plan in 2008 to reverse one of its existing lines to begin moving tar sands oil east from Western Canada, where the industry is set to boom.

Enbridge's Line 9, which starts in the western part of the country, would be capable of delivering tar sands oil to Montreal if the company reversed the flow of the entire line.

Enbridge proposed doing just that four years ago with it's so-called "Trailbreaker" project.

To move the tar sands oil on the final leg of the journey from Montreal to Maine, the company proposed utilizing the existing Portland-Montreal Pipe Line.

Read More:

http://www.fosters.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120422/GJNEWS_01/704229881/-1/FOSNEWS

Ben Jervey - What You Need to Know about Tar Sands in the U.S.

Think that that dirtiest oil on the planet is only found up in Alberta? You might be surprised then to hear that there are tar sands deposits in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming, much of which are on public lands.

While none of the American tar sands deposits are actively being developed yet, energy companies are frantically working to raise funds, secure approvals and start extracting.

To help you better understand the state of tar sands development in the U.S., here’s a primer.

Where are the American tar sands?

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) estimates that there are between 12-19 billion barrels of tar sands oil, mostly in Eastern Utah, though not all of that would be recoverable.

This map from the Utah Geologic Survey shows all of the state’s tar sands.

Read More:

http://ecowatch.org/2012/what-you-need-to-know-about-tar-sands-in-the-u-s/

Mijin Cha - Obama Picks Sides on Tar Sands: TransCanada Wins. Earth, Everyone Else Loses

A lesson in how not to reduce gas prices: the White House is backing TransCanada’s bid to build the southern portion of the controversial pipeline Keystone XL pipeline. The section to be built will run from Cushing, Oklahoma to Texas and carry crude oil pumped in the Midwest to refineries in Texas and be completed by late 2013—so it will have virtually no impact on the current high gas prices

Nor is there any evidence that it will have any impact on future gas prices. As we’ve highlighted continually, there is no guarantee that any of this refined oil will stay in the U.S. In fact, most likely, Keystone will be an export pipeline that will send oil to whoever pays the most for it, like India or China. Building the southern part of it certainly sets the stage for the full pipeline to be built. TransCanada says it will reapply for the cross-border permit soon and the decision to reapply has been welcomed by the White House.

President Obama’s move may be an attempt to fight back against Republican criticism but in doing so, he is sending a signal to environmentalist that despite his rhetoric on clean energy, it really is business as usual and dirty fossil fuels will continue to receive support and preference. On the issue of Keystone, there is no middle ground. The negative environmental and economic consequences outweigh any gains. The construction of the pipeline will not create permanent jobs. The portions already built have spilled tens of thousands of gallons of oil. Tar sands spills on the Kalamazoo River cost over $700 million to clean up, not to mention the impact on residents’ health and the local economy.

Read More:

http://www.policyshop.net/home/2012/3/21/white-house-picks-sides-in-keystone-xl-and-transcanada-is-th.html

Obama Set to Speed Up Approval of Tar Sands Pipeline

Although President Obama denied a permit for the main Keystone XL pipeline from Canada's tar sands to the Gulf of Mexico in January, it is expected that he will announce on Thursday on a visit to Cushing, Oklahoma, a plan to speed up the permit for the southern section of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry tar sands crude from Cushing to Port Arthur, Texas.

Noah Greenwald of the Center for Biological Diversity said today, “Keystone XL may be a boon to Big Oil companies in the exporting business but those profits will come at a stiff price for our land, water, wildlife and climate.” “Building Keystone XL in pieces doesn’t make it any less dangerous.”

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/03/21-1

Ross Doty - Unwanted Consequences of Keystone Pipeline

Are projects that make climate change worse -- like the Keystone XL pipeline -- in the national interest? Not if short-term expedience creates long-term disaster. The 1,711-mile long, yard-wide Keystone pipeline would transport oil from underneath Alberta's boreal forests to refineries in Oklahoma and Texas. The oil most likely would be exported from there.

One long-term cost of the pipeline is its contribution to raising the Earth's temperature. Burning fossil fuel carried in the pipeline produces carbon dioxide. Dr. James Hansen, who heads NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, calculates the Keystone pipeline will carry enough tar sands oil to raise the level of carbon dioxide on Earth by 200 parts per million (ppm). Eighteen American scientific organizations support the consensus view that excess carbon dioxide, which is at its highest level in the last 800,000 years (392 ppm), is warming our planet. An increase in the Earth's temperature causes climate change, which has many negative effects.

Read More:

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Unwanted-Consequences-of-K-by-Russ-Doty-120318-974.html

Bill McKibben - Women Lead Charge for Another Keystone XL Victory

Today was... quite a day. The bell that people struck last August when they sat in at the White House to block the Keystone Pipeline was still resonating. Not loudly -- the oil money in Congress muffled the sound. But loudly enough that we squeaked through by a 4-Senator margin, defeating a Republican amendment mandating the pipeline's construction.

A year ago almost no one had heard of the pipeline. Even four months ago, a poll of 300 "energy insiders" still found 97 percent predicting it would get its permit. But it didn't -- TransCanada can of course re-apply, but that will be another battle, down the road. For now, people power (the largest civil disobedience action in 30 years, 800,000 messages to the Senate in a single day, bodies encircling the White House shoulder to shoulder five deep) overturned the odds.

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/03/08-13

Duncan Meisel - ACTION: Tell Your Senators to Vote No on Keystone XL Today

By now I’m sure you have some idea what I’m writing about—the Senate is still up to no good with the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, and we need to remind them that this pipeline must be stopped. It looks like the big vote that we thought would come a week or two ago is happening today or tomorrow.

You’ve gotten a few emails from me about this over the past few weeks, so I’ll keep it as short as possible. We’re in a good position overall—there’’s a lot of money on the other side of this fight, but a lot of energy and resolve on ours. This is the first time that the pipeline has had an up or down vote in the Senate. If we can block Keystone on this vote, we will be in a much stronger position to keep it bottled up in the future.

I was hoping you could send a strong message to your Senators to put a nail in the coffin of this project. There are two ways you can send a message:

Read More:

http://ecowatch.org/2012/action-tell-your-senator-to-vote-no-on-keystone-xl-today/