Controversial Oil Pipeline To Be Rerouted

TransCanada announced Monday that it will reroute its planed Keystone XL Pipeline, which would carry crude oil from Canada to Texas. The company said the new route would avoid the Sandhills area of Nebraska, which is home to an important and environmentally sensitive aquifer, NPR reports.

The builders of the controversial pipeline agreed to reroute the pipeline, hoping the move would shorten any delay in the project, the L.A. Times reports.

The reversal comes four days after the Obama administration said it would explore an alternative route for the pipeline, thereby pushing final approval past the 2012 election, according to USA TODAY.  

The project has been posing political complications for the Obama administration, which has been under increasing pressure from environmental groups, as well as citizens and lawmakers in Nebraska, to reroute the pipeline, according to The New York Times.

“I can confirm the route will be changed and Nebraskans will play an important role in determining the final route,” Alex Pourbaix, TransCanada’s president said in a statement referenced by the New York Times. He said the company would support legislation in Nebraska that would shift the pipeline route.

Nebraska State Senator Mike Flood told USA TODAY that TransCanada officials notified him late Monday afternoon of the change in plans for the $7 billion tar-sands pipeline.

“There had been discussions about this over the last couple of days,” Matt Boever, a spokesman for State Senator Mike Flood, told the New York Times. “Moving it out of that Sand Hills region is important.”

The pipeline would carry diluted bitumen extracted from the tar sands of central Alberta to refineries in the Midwest and the Texas Gulf Coast, according to the L.A. Times.

Opponents of the pipeline say tar sands extraction causes more pollution than any other kind of oil production, and they have urged U.S. officials not to open the door to new Canadian extraction and export of tar sands oil, the L.A. Times reports.

However, supporters see the pipeline as a route to expanded new energy supplies from a reliable U.S. ally and, for U.S. refineries, a potential replacement for dwindling heavy crude supplies from other producers such as Venezuela and Mexico, the L.A. Times is reporting.

TransCanada official Alex Pourbax said the company remains confident it will eventually get a pipeline approved, albeit with a different route, according to the Associated Press.

The State Department is empowered to approve or reject the project because the pipeline would originate in Canada.

The department must factor in broader environmental concerns about the 1,700-mile project and recommendations of other federal agencies to determine if it is in the “national interest,” according to the New York Times.

Photo by Andrew Ottoson.