The Obama administration has been playing ping pong with the
Keystone Pipeline to bring tar sand oil from Alberta Canada to the US gulf
coast for refining. The ping pong is
not diplomacy like that of the Nixon era with China. It is simply the passing of the buck in
decision making whether the pipeline goes ahead or not.
The State Department is key to the decision but the
President of the USA must make the final decision. His energy policy so far has been a flop to
put it mildly. While he may claim he
single handedly brought shale oil and gas to market, he and Chu and now Moniz
are tainted with flops left, right, and center in the energy arena.
Yesterday the state department determined that the amount of
CO2 going into the global atmosphere will be the same whether the pipeline is
built of not. That is, they know the
Chinese will take the tar sand oil if we do not. Actually if the Chinese take the tar sand
oil the CO2 emissions will be higher than if the Keystone Pipeline is
built. The reason being is that the
refineries on the gulf coast are in place and the hydrogen supply needed to
treat the heavy crude is already in place on the gulf.
Hydrogen on the gulf is produced by reforming of natural gas
which the US has more than ample supply of natural gas based on the shale
bonanza that Obama et al. had nothing to do with. China is short of natural gas and would
either have to produce hydrogen from imported LNG or from coal. Both of these alternates have far higher
carbon footprints than the hydrogen from natural gas in the US gulf. Viola the Keystone Pipeline makes ecologic
sense on this basis.
From an economics perspective even Obama the deer in the
headlights of the first debate gets the arithmetic that jobs and GDP will be
created by value adding to the heavy tar sand crude oil in the USA. The New York Times put their slant on
yesterday’s news that the State Department has found no worsening of global CO2
emissions if Keystone gets built.
The real question for Mr. Obama is whether he wants to be remembered
for being a Keystone Cop type President or a President whose only tangible
accomplishments in the energy arena was to have funded Solyndra, A 123, Ener 1,
Fisker, and all the other bust companies Leslie Stahl listed in her Sixty
Minutes piece that outed cleantech. I
just hope that the President does not turn to Al Gore for advice on how to make
the decision on the pipeline. Mr.
President even Bono does not believe Al Gore any more.
His Presidential Library is at stake. I think he is a smart man and will finally use Insight not Politics.
ReplyDeleteHe can't stand for a 3 rd term, so he can kiss voter sentiment goodbye.
How many books in GW's library ? One. The Lorax
ReplyDeleteHow many books in oh bummer's library. Two. The inconvenient truth and The convenient untruth. The second will soon be written
ReplyDeleteHow many books in GW's library ? One. The Lorax
ReplyDelete
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