Energy company wants $15 billion from the Biden administration for blocking the Keystone XL pipeline

 TC Energy Corporation, the company that developed the Keystone XL pipeline project, is seeking to recover more than $15 billion in damages from the United States, claiming the US government breached its free trade obligations when it revoked the permit for the project.

The energy company announced in June that it is pulling the plug on the controversial Keystone pipeline project after the Biden administration revoked the permit on the president's first day in the White House. The announcement ended more than a decade of controversy over the pipeline, marking a win for environmentalists who argued the project would worsen the climate crisis.

To recover economic damages from the project's cancellation, TC Energy (TRP) on Friday filed a Notice of Intent with the US State Department to initiate a legacy NAFTA claim under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, the company said in a statement.

When the permit cancellation was announced, TC Energy warned that it would "directly lead to the layoff of thousands of union workers."...MORE

Keystone XL Pipeline Developer Nixes Project

The Canadian company that developed the Keystone XL oil pipeline announced on Wednesday that it would abandon the project. TC Energy, based in Calgary, Alberta, said construction of the pipeline ceased following President Biden’s revocation of a presidential permit in January 2021. “TC Energy Corporation…confirmed today that after a comprehensive review of its options, and in consultation with its partner, the Government of Alberta, it has terminated the Keystone XL Pipeline Project,” the company said in a statement. The pipeline would have transported oil over 1,700 miles from Alberta to the Texas Gulf Coast, where the oil would be processed in refineries. Environmentalist groups have long fought construction of the pipeline, citing concerns over potential spills, and some Native American groups have opposed construction on or near tribal lands. “The Keystone XL pipeline disserves the U.S. national interest,” according to Biden’s January 20th executive order revoking the construction permit for the pipeline. The order argues that because of climate change, and “because most greenhouse gas emissions originate beyond our borders,” the U.S. must exercise leadership to put the “world on a sustainable climate pathway.” TC Energy emphasized that the pipeline itself would have operated with net-zero carbon emissions. The company developed “a first-of-its-kind, industry leading plan to operate the pipeline with net-zero emissions throughout its lifecycle,” TC CEO François Poirier said on Wednesday. “We will continue to identify opportunities to apply this level of ingenuity across our business going forward, including our current evaluation of the potential to power existing U.S. assets with renewable energy.”  LINK

Rural Electric Companies Hit Hard by Keystone XL Cancellation

For more than a decade, Jeff Birkeland had been waiting expectantly in the hope that the Keystone XL (KXL) pipeline would finally materialize and bring with it a much-needed boost to his rural community. His dreams were dashed overnight. Birkeland is the CEO of West Central Electric Cooperative, which is located in Murdo, a small city in South Dakota with a population of less than 1,000. TransCanada, now known as TC Energy, the firm that commissioned the KXL pipeline, first approached his company back in 2008. In 2011, he signed a contract with TC Energy to build a transmission line and two substations that would serve power along the KXL route. West Central Electric was meant to start producing power for pump stations along the XL route as early as November 2011, before the pipeline was put on hold. In March 2019, then-President Donald Trump granted TC Energy a presidential permit to construct and operate the XL pipeline. Biden revoked that permit via executive order in one of his first moves as president. “It basically shut a lot of what we were doing down overnight,” Birkeland told The Epoch Times. “We’re out $90 million, that’s what that means to us.” Electric co-ops are private companies that deliver electricity to their customers, also known as members. Rural electric cooperatives serve 56 percent of the nation and account for about 12 percent of total electricity sales in the United States, according to the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. There are multiple co-ops in the area that range in size in terms of employees and areas they cover. West Central Electric has more than 3,671 members and covers more than 7,000 square miles, and Birkeland said the cancellation of the project hits small rural communities like Murdo especially hard. Birkeland fired off a number of figures highlighting the negative economic effects of the KXL cancellation, during an interview at his office. If they had been able to start work on the project in 2012, school districts in the area would have received $1.7 million in tax revenue, he said. South Dakota will also miss out on $4 million in state sales taxes. And if the entire pipeline was up and running, it was expected to generate more than $100 million in property tax revenue along the route. The pipeline would also contribute $3.4 billion to the GDP of the United States on an annual basis. His company now has $14 million worth of materials sitting idly in the warehouse. “Essentially, this tells me our rates are going up,” he said...MORE

Biden may cancel Keystone XL pipeline permit as soon as his first day in office: source

U.S. President-elect Joe Biden is planning to cancel the permit for the $9 billion Keystone XL pipeline project as one of his first acts in office, and perhaps as soon as his first day, according to a source familiar with his thinking. President Donald Trump, a Republican, had made building the pipeline a central promise of his presidential campaign. Biden, who will be inaugurated on Wednesday, was vice president in the Obama administration when it rejected the project as contrary to its efforts to combat climate change. The words "Rescind Keystone XL pipeline permit" appear on a list of executive actions likely scheduled for the first day of Biden's presidency, according to an earlier report..MORE

Keystone XL puts Biden on hot seat by striking deal with four labor unions

Keystone XL has struck a deal with four leading unions to build the Alberta-to-Nebraska oil pipeline, creating a potential headache for former Vice President Joseph R. Biden, who has vowed to kill the project even as he woos the labor vote. In a Wednesday announcement, TC Energy said a project labor agreement has been reached with the Laborers International Union of North America, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the International Union of Operating Engineers, and the United Association of Union Plumbers and Pipefitters. “We’re proud to reach today’s agreement with TC Energy that will put UA members to work on this project, bringing safe and efficient energy to American families,” said Mark McManus, general president of the pipefitters’ union. “This project will bring good paying jobs to our members, all while keeping energy costs low and delivering a boost to local communities and their economies. We’re ready to get to work.” The agreement adds another wrinkle to the 2020 presidential campaign on a contentious, high-profile issue that pits Mr. Biden, a staunch opponent of the pipeline, squarely against President Trump, who has championed it...MORE

Supreme Court deals major blow to Keystone XL project

The Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for several pipeline projects to proceed under a fast-track permitting process but excluded the controversial Keystone XL expansion from their ruling, forcing major delays. Though the case is a partial win for the Trump administration, the exclusion of Keystone XL is a major defeat for a President who made good on a campaign promise to move forward with the project through executive order. A federal judge in May sided with environmental groups, requiring that new oil and gas pipelines must undergo a lengthy permitting and regulation process in order to build across bodies of water. That judge's ruling canceled the so-called "Nationwide Permit 12" for several new pipelines, which authorized and fast-tracked work on pipelines that run across bodies of water. That ruling stated that the Army Corps of Engineers did not adequately consider the projects' environmental impact on endangered species. The ruling required the projects that received such a permit to stop construction while the environmental impact study was completed. The Supreme Court on Monday invalidated that lower court ruling in part, allowing many projects to go ahead while the environmental reviews are done, but excluded the Keystone XL. The Keystone XL pipeline must still abide by the arduous environmental review process, the justices ruled. If lengthy enough, that process could jeopardize the pipeline's existence, pending the outcome of the 2020 election. Democrat Joe Biden has pledged to rescind the permit for Keystone if he wins...MORE

How the American environmental movement dealt a blow to Alberta's oilpatch

The strategy to stifle Alberta's oilsands came together in a hotel near a mall in Minneapolis over a decade ago. It was the fall of 2008, and a group of environmental activists spent part of a conference there brainstorming tactics for slowing down the growth of the oilsands — and they identified pipelines as the most vulnerable target. One in particular fit the bill: Keystone XL — a 1,897-kilometre pipeline to be built by TC Energy that would carry up to 830,000 barrels of crude oil per day from Hardisty, Alta., to Nebraska, where it would link up with the company's existing pipeline network. Their fateful decision at that meeting to throw money and organizational effort into attacking the proposed pipeline opened a difficult new chapter for the oilpatch. Now, those activists are claiming victory. A decade later, Alberta crude is increasingly choked off from international markets; growth forecasts have been cut in half; iconic Canadian energy companies are rebranding themselves or moving head offices; and parts of Western Canada are simmering with talk of separatism. Several American activists interviewed in recent days cited the tactical decisions made in 2008 as setting the stage for the industry's current woes. "Keystone was a turning point," said Kenny Bruno, an organizer and author in the environmental movement who helped shape the anti-pipeline strategy. "It really did impact the industry — as we intended."...MORE

Keystone XL pipeline opponents pursue new legal challenge

Environmentalists asked a federal judge on Monday to cancel approvals issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada, opening another front in the legal fight over a long-delayed energy project that President Donald Trump has tried to push through to completion. Attorneys for the Northern Plains Resource Council, Sierra Club and other groups filed the latest lawsuit against the $8 billion tar sands pipeline in Montana, where they’ve previously won favorable rulings in related cases. First proposed in 2008, Keystone XL was rejected by President Barack Obama but revived under Trump. An appeals court last month lifted an injunction that had blocked construction. That came after Trump issued a new permit for the project, in a bid to nullify a legal challenge that had been based on a previous permit from his administration. A separate lawsuit challenging the president’s actions on the permit is pending in federal court. Monday’s lawsuit gives pipeline opponents another avenue to delay or stop it should Trump’s permit be upheld...MORE

Keystone at a crossroads: Tribes question running oil pipeline under Missouri, Milk rivers

The Missouri and Milk rivers merge just downstream from this major landmark in northeastern Montana. At this confluence, TransCanada is proposing to run almost a half mile of 36-inch diameter oil pipeline beneath the two rivers. Not if the Assiniboine and Sioux tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation have anything to say about it. About 60 miles downstream from this crossing, the tribes of Fort Peck tap the Missouri River for water that's treated and then distributed across northeastern Montana through a massive, federally funded water system that will serve 30,000 residents, both on and off the reservation, when it's completed. “We’re adamant they move it,” said Floyd Azure, Fort Peck tribal chairman, from his office in Poplar, where two sacred staffs adorned with eagle feathers stand behind his desk. “There’s no two ways about it.” Cleanup responses to oil spills and potential impacts of spills on water resources have become sticking points as TransCanada tries get the $8 billion Keystone XL oil pipeline project off the ground in Montana, its U.S. starting point. Chairman Floyd Azure says the Fort Peck Tribes want the current route of the Keystone XL Pipeline moved because it is upstream from the intake of the water system serving residents throughout northcentral Montana. Chairman Floyd Azure says the Fort Peck Tribes want the current route of the Keystone XL Pipeline moved because it is upstream from the intake of the water system serving residents throughout northcentral Montana.  In particular, the proposed crossing of the pipeline at the merger of two major Montana rivers is colliding with the interests of the 11,000 residents of Fort Peck, a 100-mile-by-40-mile rectangular reservation spanning four counties. Tribal leaders say the threat of an oil spill isn't just their concern...MORE

Presidential authority at issue in Keystone Pipeline case to be heard in Great Falls

The $8 billion Keystone XL oil pipeline will be argued in federal court in Great Falls on Wednesday as the Trump administration pushes forward with a project killed by former President Barack Obama. Northern Plains Resource Council, Bold Alliance, Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. and Sierra Club filed a lawsuit against the government over its issuing of a permit for the project in March, following Trump’s November election win. They’re suing Thomas A. Shannon Jr., under secretary for political affairs for the State Department, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, arguing a permit for the pipeline was issued without sufficient environmental review in violation of federal laws. A motion by the government to dismiss the case will be heard before District Judge Brian M. Morris. “The main issue is whether or not the court has jurisdiction over this lawsuit,” said Doug Hayes, a senior attorney for the Sierra Club. Issuing a presidential permit for an international crossing is an exercise of the president’s authority over foreign affairs and national security and therefore can't be reviewed, the government’s court filings say...more

Judge orders gov’t review of Keystone pipeline documents

Federal officials must go back and review documents related to the disputed Keystone XL oil pipeline, under a Wednesday court ruling that came after environmentalists accused President Donald Trump’s administration of withholding details on the project’s approval. U.S. District Judge Brian Morris said the government must provide any relevant documents by March 21 or explain why they should be withheld. The ruling came in a lawsuit pending in federal court in Montana from environmentalists seeking to stop the 1,179-mile (1,897-kilometer) pipeline. It would carry crude from Canada’s oil sands region to U.S. refineries. The project has become a flashpoint in the debate over climate change. It was blocked by former President Barack Obama in 2015 before President Donald Trump revived it last year. U.S. Justice Department attorneys fought against releasing the sought-after documents. They said it could take more than six years and cost $6.3 million for officials to go through an estimated 5 million pages of documents that would need to be reviewed before they could be released. Attorney Jackie Prange with the Natural Resources Defense Council said the government’s time and expense estimate was “vastly overblown” and included documents unrelated to Keystone...more

TransCanada: More than 44,000 gallons of oil recovered from Keystone spill so far

Energy company TransCanada Corp announced Friday that it recovered 44,400 gallons, or 1,057 barrels, of oil following a spill from the Keystone pipeline in Amherst, S.D. Roughly 210,000 gallons of oil are reported to have spilled in the region due to a leak earlier this month. TransCanada is cleaning up oil from the spill to remove contaminants from the soil. About 170 workers are participating in clean-up activities, the company said. The company had announced Nov. 16 that because of the leak it shut down its pipeline, which produces 590,000 barrels of oil per day. TransCanada has not yet announced when the pipeline will reopen. The company also said it tested the water in the area...more

Nebraska approves Keystone XL pipeline route, eliminating last major hurdle for project

After nearly a decade of debate that turned the project into a national flash point over energy development and environmentalism, the Keystone XL oil pipeline now is on the fast track to completion after clearing the last major hurdle Monday in Nebraska. The state’s Public Service Commission voted Monday morning to green-light the pipeline’s route, the final regulatory step needed before TransCanada, the owner and operator of Keystone, can begin construction. The commission voted 3 to 2 in favor of the project. Crystal Rhoades, a member of the commission who voted against the pipeline, said that changes to TransCanada’s proposed route may have left some state landowners in the dark, and she argued there’s little evidence the pipeline will actually help her state. “There are at least 40 landowners along the approved route who may not even know their land is on this pipeline’s path,” she said. “The applicant provided insufficient evidence to substantiate any positive economic impact for Nebraska for this project.” The commission members who voted “yes” on the project did not defend their positions during the brief meeting. The $8 billion project, which will transport more than 800,000 barrels of oil each day from Alberta, Canada, to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast, has long been a priority for the oil and gas industry. Sector leaders say the Nebraska commission’s vote Monday sends a strong signal that the state, and the nation as a whole, is committed to energy development...more

Keystone oil pipeline leaks in South Dakota, as Nebraska weighs XL

TransCanada Corp (TRP.TO) shut part of its Keystone oil pipeline system after a 5,000-barrel leak in South Dakota, the company said on Thursday, four days before neighboring Nebraska was set to decide on the company’s long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline. Opponents of TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL pipeline seized on the spill, saying it highlighted the risks posed by the XL project - which has become a symbol for environmentalists of fossil-fuel pollution and global warming. TransCanada said in a statement it discovered the leak in the town of Amherst at 6 a.m. on Thursday after systems detected a drop in pressure, and that it was working with authorities as it investigates the cause...more

Presidential authority at issue in Keystone Pipeline case to be heard in Great Falls

The $8 billion Keystone XL oil pipeline will be argued in federal court in Great Falls on Wednesday as the Trump administration pushes forward with a project killed by former President Barack Obama. Northern Plains Resource Council, Bold Alliance, Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. and Sierra Club filed a lawsuit against the government over its issuing of a permit for the project in March, following Trump’s November election win. They’re suing Thomas A. Shannon Jr., under secretary for political affairs for the State Department, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, arguing a permit for the pipeline was issued without sufficient environmental review in violation of federal laws. A motion by the government to dismiss the case will be heard before District Judge Brian M. Morris. Issuing a presidential permit for an international crossing is an exercise of the president’s authority over foreign affairs and national security and therefore can't be reviewed, the government’s court filings say...more

Keystone XL Is Approved, But Will Anyone Use It?

Oil producers and refineries aren’t interested in buying the Canadian oil that the Keystone XL pipeline is supposed to ship through the U.S., anonymous sources told the Wall Street Journal Thursday. TransCanada, which owns the pipeline, is struggling to get enough customers for it, according to the WSJ. The company is still committed to completing Keystone XL as it should still be profitable in the long term, but it will likely take years for TransCanada to recoup its investment. Oil prices today are far lower than they were a decade ago when the pipeline was proposed. Back then, prices were above $130 a barrel, which meant that demand from oil producers and refineries for the pipeline was high. A barrel of oil today sells for about $45, largely due to the emergence of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. TransCanada has spent $3 billion to date on Keystone XL, and expects that it will eventually have to spend $8 billion constructing the pipeline...more

Oil is flowing in the Dakota Access pipeline, but protesters aren't giving up

Even as oil flows through the now-completed Dakota Access pipeline, the fight against the hotly contested line still lives on in a makeshift camp here in Iowa County. Little Creek Camp, with its collective of 20 or so environmentalists, opened after federal authorities in February evacuated the massive anti-pipeline encampment near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota. Those campers say they believe the pipeline can still be defeated — even as its owners, Energy Transfer Partners, plan to finish filling the 1,172-mile line with crude oil Sunday, shipping it from the Bakken formation in North Dakota to a distribution hub in Patoka, Ill. "It's disheartening to say the least," said Glenn Williamson, a 41-year-old camp member from Sioux Falls, S.D., "but for some of us, it's strengthening our resolve as well. We know we still need to be here and we are going to be as active, if not more, in the future." The campers, spread among 14 acres of tall prairie grass and thick woods, hold out hope that the Iowa Supreme Court will reverse the Iowa Utilities Board's decision that granted Energy Transfer Partners' eminent domain authority for the project...more

Life on the Keystone XL route: where opponents fear the ‘black snake’

Our people call it the black snake because it is evil,” says Tressa Welch, as thunder clouds steamroll the blue sky over the plains of Wolf Point. “And like snakes they come out of nowhere; they slither and strike unknown.” She faces southwards where, a couple of miles away, forks of lightning crack over the Missouri river. The 2m acre Fort Peck Indian reservation straddles this winding water source, providing sustenance for the almost 7,000 Assiniboine and Sioux tribe members here and thousands of others throughout north-east Montana. It is the river that Welch and other Native American activists on the reserve say the Keystone XL oil pipeline – or the “black snake” – will corrupt. The river maintains the deer, the fish, the native plants, sweet grasses and sacred sage. “Anything that threatens my way of life and my spiritual well-being, I consider myself at war with,” she says, her two-year-old daughter by her side. “I will do whatever it takes.” Although the pipeline is expected to cross the Missouri just outside of the reservation, it will do so about 40 miles upstream of the tribes’ multimillion-dollar water treatment plant, which supplies clean water to communities throughout the entire region. A leak at this junction, they say, could be catastrophic. The project’s backers insist it will be safe. The gargantuan underground pipeline is set to carry a daily load of 830,000 barrels of oil over 1,204 miles, from the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta, Canada – where it enjoys the support of the prime minister, Justin Trudeau – across the US border into eastern Montana. It will travel down to South Dakota, eventually linking with the first Keystone pipeline, which was completed in 2010, in southern Nebraska. The route connects not just countries and states, but three US presidencies. First proposed by the private Canadian infrastructure giant TransCanada during George W Bush’s final months in office, the project was eventually rejected by the Obama administration in 2015, only to be resurrected almost as soon Donald Trump was sworn in at the beginning of this year...more

Green groups promise guerrilla warfare tactics to stop Keystone pipeline

Environmental activists vowed over the weekend to fight the Keystone XL oil pipeline to the bitter end, insisting the Trump administration’s approval of the long-delayed project will not be the final word. Powerful green groups are launching a two-pronged strategy to block the pipeline in the streets and in the courts. First, they intend to use a state review process in Nebraska — where Keystone still does not have a legal route, despite federal approval of the project — to delay any movement forward. Nebraska state officials charged with approving the pipeline’s path say a decision shouldn’t be expected until September at the earliest, and environmentalists could drag that process out even longer. The second piece of their plan centers on the kind of guerrilla warfare tactics seen throughout last year during the fight over the Dakota Access pipeline. Activists say they’ll organize protests and even set up camps along Keystone’s proposed route, potentially blocking construction of the project if and when it’s set to begin..more.

Trump approves Keystone pipeline

The Trump administration gave the Keystone XL pipeline its key federal permit Friday, clearing a major hurdle for the project that former President Barack Obama rejected in 2015. The State Department announced Friday morning that its under secretary for political affairs, Tom Shannon, issued the permit, two months after President Trump signed an executive order to revive the project after Obama’s rejection. “In making his determination that issuance of this permit would serve the national interest, the under secretary considered a range of factors, including but not limited to foreign policy; energy security; environmental, cultural, and economic impacts; and compliance with applicable law and policy,” State said. The decision closes a significant chapter in the long-running saga over the controversial oil pipeline, which has been a flashpoint in the debate surrounding climate change and dependence on foreign oil. It fulfills a major campaign promise of President Trump and a top priority that congressional Republicans and the oil industry have had for years...more