Pipeline, Pollution, and Politics: All Suck

    One of the biggest issues these days that regard politics and energy is the Keystone XL Pipeline. The Keystone Pipeline is a pipeline that carries synthetic crude oil and bitumen from Alberta, Canada to multiple parts of the U.S., running all the way to the gulf coast of Texas. This is a major issue due to the many environmental risk that pipeline extension would cause. Some of the risk is the pipeline could pollute the air and contaminate our water supply. It also poses hazard to migratory birds and other wildlife. Also the construction of the pipeline could potentially cause earthquakes because it crosses through an active seismic zone.

    One of the political highlights was not a debate over oil versus alternative energy, but whether we wanted oil from Canada, or Venezuela. The CEO of TransCanada, which is one of the companies involved in the pipeline, said that if the Canadian oil doesn’t reach the Gulf in an Environmentally friendly way, the it would be brought by tankers that produce higher greenhouse- gas emissions and put the environment at greater risk. I felt that this statement is very misleading; what he is saying is technically true, but the all the other environmentally issues that come with building the pipeline is nothing compared to greenhouse gasses. The plans for this pipeline would go throw very valuables places to our environment like the Sandhills in Nebraska, which s the largest wetland ecosystem and it would also cross the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest freshwater reserve in the world. By destroying and possible polluting these areas, it would do more harm to the environment than tankers releasing greenhouse gasses. Aside from the physical harm to the environments, people who live on the lands that pipeline would cross, would also be in affected. They would be living in fence-line areas and that would cause major health issues to some people. Some people have already been threatened by TransCanada to confiscate private land, before the government even came to a decision.

     The Keystone Pipeline is a perfect example of how energy-politics in the U.S. affects the masses. It is such a right-wing approach and shows how politics affect the way the our environment is handled.