On Thursday, Nancy Pelosi, the ranking Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives, said the oil that would flow to the Gulf Coast through Keystone XL ‘is for export.’ Supporters of the project, including major refiner Valero Energy Corp., maintain that’s not true.YURI GRIPAS/Reuters
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Alberta Premier Alison Redford spent a few thousand dollars last weekend buying a New York Times' advertisement touting oil sands crude as "green" as well as coming from a friendly neighbour and ally, unlike those faraway folk in unreliable and unsavory places like the Middle East.
In terms of name recognition and willingness to spend, Ms. Redford may be out of her league as the Keystone battle heats up nationally.
But there was also a glimmer of good news this week from on high for the pro-Keystone forces, including Prime Minister Stephen Harper who has called the decision a no-brainer.
Aboard Air Force One last weekend, one of Barack Obama's spokesmen, Josh Earnest, was fielding Keystone questions after anti-pipeline protestors had dogged the president's trip to Chicago. Mr. Earnest gave the sort of response that should delight Mr. Harper, Ms. Redford and the parade of premiers promoting Keystone, the controversial Canadian pipeline intended to funnel carbon-heavy Alberta oil sands crude to Texas refineries on the Gulf Coast. "Thousands of miles of pipeline have been built since President Obama took office, and that hasn't had a measurable impact on climate change," Mr. Earnest said.
Treating Keystone as just another pipeline is like manna from heaven for its promoters. Asked whether big investment in green energy sources would make far more of a climate change difference that blocking Keystone, Mr. Earnest added: "There is no question about that."
Conversely, the White House is hinting that it might delay imposing tough new emissions standards on coal-fired electrical generating plants, a move certain to infuriate environmentalists.
Those gaming Mr. Obama's Keystone decision, expected this summer, must now factor whether any delay on coal-fired emissions makes it more likely that Keystone will be rejected so as to prove to the Democratic left and the environmental movement that the president really is serious about climate change.
What is certain is that Keystone is becoming a symbol, a test of political promise, and not just a pipeline.
Robert Redford, the actor with the same last name as Albert's premier, says this about the pipeline: "Keystone XL tar-sands pipeline would carry the dirtiest oil on the planet from Canada to America's Gulf Coast's refineries and ports, and then most of it likely exported overseas … We don't need another pipeline for Canadian tar sands. It's not in our national interest but is a profit scheme for big oil that needs to be rejected," Mr. Redford said last month, adding his name to a growing circle of celebrity activists vilifying Keystone.
Premier Redford may soon be vastly outspent too. California's hedge-fund billionaire Tom Steyer, who regards man-made climate change as the gravest threat to mankind, is willing to spend "tens of millions" on political advocacy turning heads and switching votes. Mr. Steyer has already targeted one Massachusetts Democrat who dared back Keystone.
That creates a new and dynamic battleground for Keystone XL.
What looked like an Oval Office decision that Mr. Obama had wisely delayed until after he had won re-election has morphed into a Democratic litmus test. The "How green is my candidate?" question may soon be measured by a willingness to publicly oppose Keystone, even as the overall climate-change consequences of importing Alberta's crude may be trivial in terms of actual emissions.
Still, the gravest threat to Keystone now seems to come from an emerging portrayal of it as a means to get Alberta's landlocked and heavily discounted crude to U.S. ports for profitable export to third countries rather than help slake United States oil needs. In fact, opponents say the U.S. doesn't need another one million barrels-a-day in imports and will soon pump more oil and gas than it can consume. That Congressional Democrats are paying close attention was stunningly clear when, last week, Nancy Pelosi, the party's most powerful elected official outside the President, said: "It just is amazing to me that they can say [Keystone would create] 'tens of thousands of jobs and reduce our dependence on foreign oil,'" adding: "The oil is for export and the jobs are nowhere near that."
Paul Koring reports from The Globe's Washington bureau.