Keystone XL Pipeline Exposed
A better title to this Blog
maybe “Keystone XL Pipeline Confusion” But first I’ll write about the expose. I
have been confused by where the push is from for the Keystone XL pipeline and
who is opposing it. Experience from my corn grower advocate work, I learned
what you hear is not what is really happening. Or you can kill a program by
supporting it. As a advocate I learned that from the trips to Washington to
“communicate” with our “hired gun” i.e. lobbyist.
My confusion on the Keystone XL
pipeline was amplified when I attended the North Dakota Energy Expo in
Bismarck. One of the keynote speakers was Senator Hoeven, recently elected,
replacing retired Senator Dorgan. The first part of his speech was enthusiastic
and informative when he talked about the Bakken oil play. But his voice changed
as he closed his speech promoting the Keystone XL pipeline ,like a school Boy reciting something he memorized. It was
obvious he was handed a script and still had not developed the skills to sound
like he meant it. But who handed him the script?
I have been suspicious that Koch
brothers were behind the Keystone XL pipeline. I know the Koch brothers own the
refinery at Rosemont Minnesota and the crude oil comes from the oil sands of
Alberta Canada. A Google search confirms the Koch Brothers have huge
investments in the Alberta oil sands and the Keystone XL pipeline would supply
crude to refineries in Kansas and Oklahoma, refineries owned by the Koch
brothers. This can be easily verified by using this string in Google search
“Koch industries Canada oil sands”.
The methods for someone of Koch
Bros wealth to influence congress are many. The rewards from the oil sands are
many. And it is widely known the Koch Bros contribute large amounts of money to
any organization that promotes anti environmentalist activity. They probably
will continue this activity until their homes in the Hamptons are flooded by
glacier melts.
For those not familiar with the
oil sand extraction, it requires huge amounts of energy to extract, which is
highly polluting process. The crude oil is very low motor fuel yield and refining results in high CO2 emmisions. For info use
Google with this string “oil sands crude energy balance”.
A disclaimer: the web site from energy balance are written by people who
take swipes at corn ethanol. They ignore two important facts. 1. Ethanol is
about one half of the energy of the corn, the other half is a high protein
poultry, hog or cattle feed. 2. All the carbon in corn is recycled carbon and
the corn growing is renewable. Remove oil from the ground, burn it, its gone.
Now the confusion I mentioned in
the opening paragraph. Since I attend many energy conferences, I get E mails
from many sources. The latest was about lithium in the Canadian oil sands. A
large amount of lithium will be used would be used for batteries in electric
powered cars. Only known source of lithium is in South America. Is the oil
sands lithium propaganda or fact? Or is this about some high paid Koch Industry
publicist?
