President Barack Obama is getting flak from the left and right for his failure to take decisive action on the Keystone XL pipeline, which would cut across the United States to transport Canadian oil to the Gulf Coast.
But for all the controversy the proposal has created, it doesn’t offer much in the way of economic benefits, as its advocates claim. Nor would it spell climate disaster, as environmental activists assert.
Keystone XL has come to represent much more than the effects of the pipeline alone. Climate activists call it a test of Obama’s resolve about limiting human-made climate change. Supporters of Keystone say a veto of the project would prove the president doesn’t care about jobs.
With legislations passed by the House and Senate, Obama has vowed to veto the bill that would approve the pipeline’s construction.
The project would create several thousand temporary construction jobs, and a few hundred permanent jobs. Almost all of its oil would be exported to other nations. The method of extracting oil from tar sands emits 17 percent more greenhouse gases than typical drilling.
The United States should not feel obligated to build a pipeline to facilitate Canada’s transport of dirty oil. At the same time, the pipeline wouldn’t result in higher fossil-fuel consumption; tar sands oil will still be extracted in Canada and used for energy, whether shipped through Keystone, by rail or another route.
Whatever the outcome, the controversy has forced a debate in Congress about energy.
Even after Keystone, the urgent work of crafting the right policies and cutting emissions lies ahead.
The above editorial appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Jan. 29.
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