A Novel Way to Fight the Keystone XL Pipeline

[Anymouse]

In my E-mail Inbox today, from [link:http://www.boldnebraska.org|Bold Nebraska
]
NEBRASKA VS. KEYSTONE XL:
BUILD OUR ENERGY FUTURE

Donate now to help build a wind turbine and solar-powered barn directly inside the Keystone XL pipeline route.

Dear Pipeline Fighter,
This summer, we need your help to declare our independence from tarsands and stand up for our future, by literally building our own clean energy in Nebraska. Bold Nebraska is partnering with Sierra Club, 350 and Nebraska Farmers Union on some "barn-raising" renewable energy projects: with the local community's help, we'll install a wind turbine and solar-powered barn on land directly inside the proposed Keystone XL pipeline route.

If President Obama approves Keystone XL, he'll then have to tear down these clean and locally-produced energy sources to make way for dirty and foreign tarsands.

Donate $50 now to help us build our energy future, and we'll put your name on the solar-powered barn.
The Build Our Energy project is part of "Summer Heat," a series of actions planned across the country this summer by a coalition formed to "turn up the heat" against the fossil fuel industry. In order to build these renewable energy projects in Nebraska, we need to raise $65,000 over the next two months. We're also welcoming folks who want to come out to central Nebraska on a weekend this summer to help with the physical construction of the wind turbine and solar-powered barn, and then celebrate the day's hard work with us at a community BBQ.

Can we count on you to join us in Nebraska this summer to help literally Build Our Energy future? Click here for details and sign-up to volunteer.

This is the summer of the Pipeline Fighter declaring our independence from tarsands. With your help, we'll not just tell, but we will show President Obama he'll have to bulldoze our investment in a clean energy future if he wants to make way for dirty, foreign tarsands.

Thank you for your continued support and we look forward to seeing you in the Summer Heat to Build Our Energy!
Jane Kleeb and the Bold Nebraska team

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. I think this is a smart move.

There's nothing quite like a pre-emptive move against that gawd-awful Keystone mess.

[Anymouse]

2. I live in the Panhandle . . .

. . . so a spill or whatnot would not directly affect my water supply (which comes straight out of the ground) and the route a couple thousand feet lower than where I live. However, the rather fragile Ogallala Aquifer would be irreparably damaged with any significant spill, to say nothing of the pollution caused by burning this stuff.

It seems rather strange this Red State is pretty much the only opposition to the line. The Governor was opposed but made one of the most dramatic flip-flops in Nebraska political history http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/22/nebraska-governor-dave-heineman-keystone_n_2526818.html

There should be a steep political price for this line going through. Tearing down much cleaner wind and solar energy sources for this ought to cost Gov Heineman and President Obama (who claims he is all for renewable or clean energy sources). It seems odd that very conservative ranchers and farmers are aligned with ecologists and environmentalists, but they all have a common cause.

[wercal]

3. This strategy presumes that Keystone has not yet acquired easements...

I wonder if that's true.

[felix_numinous]

4. K&R!!

I like this idea a lot!!

[limpyhobbler]

5. K&R!

[Anymouse]

6. Concerning Easements

TransCanada may have some, but not all.

The route for the pipeline was moved, which would have rendered any existing easements moot.

Moreover, it only takes one rancher or farmer in the path of the route to do this, and there are a lot of ranchers and farmers opposed to this. They view the land as their heritage and livelihood (we'll leave the Natives that viewed it that way as an exercise for the student of history), and pretty much stand opposed from the SD line to the KS line.

This is one reason for the argument put forth by the cheap-labour conservatives that TransCanada needs to have eminent domain rights (even though it is a corporation based in another country) - so they can condemn the land along the route.

This is also one of the reasons to do this. Get the windmill and barn up before the land is condemned or someone offers enough money for an easement.

They got my $50.00.

[txwhitedove]

7. I heard 2-days ago from Canadians working with XL groups that movement of tar sands oil

WILL happen. Period. Whether via another existing pipeline, via rail, via whatever, this will happen. That it didn't matter about the protests, because they always "have other ways". Just thrown out there on the table like so what.
Made me sick.

[Socialistlemur]

9. They don't move tar, they move crude oil

The material they send in the pipeline is crude oil. Tar can't be pumped long distance. As such the pipeline is just another pipeline, and the USA has many. The comment is right. The Longhorn pipeline was reversed and its shipping oil from Cushing to the Texas refineries. This helped reduce the refining profits for large oil companies in the Midwest, and puts pressure on heavy oil supplies out of Venezuela, which come to the USA by tanker. The Venezuelan crude from their Orinoco oil belt and the Canadian Alberta tar sand crudes are the same material anyway. And it's also modified or diluted, arrives in the USA as a crude oil because it can't be sent as is by tanker.

[Anymouse]

8. Rail or truck . . .

. . . won't happen or they'd be doing it already. Bitumen (asphalt) is particularly tough to ship by truck or rail other than in small quantities.

Moving the route costs the company lots of money in new route studies and wasted effort on obtaining easements along the existing route.

On the other hand, throwing another windmill or solar barn in the way is cheap, relative to the cost of said studies.

Thus the strategy, to force President Obama to either take a stance to halt this (which is within his power) or force him to tear down relatively greener energy sources standing in the way (if he does that, we know exactly what he thinks on climate science, regardless of pretty speeches).

And this should be an issue put to any Democratic (or indeed any) candidate. The hard question is: what are you going to do about this pipeline, which ships oil which should stay in the ground forever? Any answer other than "oppose it" means the candidate is not serious about anthropomorphically-induced climate change.

[Socialistlemur]

10. Rail and truck are being used massively

I think there's a serious lack of information regarding what's transported. I wrote a short primer about this in another thread, but I'll repeat it a bit here: the Alberta tar sand, Venezuela Orinoco, and other super heavy oils are not transportable long distance. The crude is either blended to make a pumpable blend, a bit lighter than Mexico Maya or similar to an Arab heavy,,,or it's processed in an upgrader and used to make a synthetic oil. This involves cracking the heavy oil molecules and adding hydrogen. The synthetic oil is designed, and there are many types. Some of them have a lot of hydrogen added and look like a light high quality crude, without any sulfur. So the industry will indeed get around the problem, if they have to they'll make a super high quality syncrude w/o sulfur. All of us create the pull by consuming gasoline and diesel. And this pull is gigantic. It will be satisfied.

[Not Sure]

12. Actually, moving asphalt by rail is very common

It is often handled in 20,000-25,000 gallon tank cars. The product is shipped at an elevated temperature, to enable the material to be unloaded from the car. It can be reheated at the delivery site for unloading if the load was not moved as an expedited shipment.

If this material has to be transported at all, I think rail is the best method. Accidents resulting in loss of product are uncommon and even then, a cleanup of one or two spilled tank cars can be handled quickly compared to an underground pipeline rupture that releases untold amounts of oil underground before the problem is caught and corrected.

[Socialistlemur]

11. Silly idea

One barn? One windmill? This is a scam to get your money. They'll use eminent domain, tear it down and build it somewhere else. And I sincerely doubt you'll get permits to build on a right off way. The final solution is to drill a hole right under your building. It's been done.