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OPINION: 'Keystone will worsen climate change' by Sheldon Whitehouse and Henry A. Waxman on CNN.com.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/15/opinion/white-house-waxman-keystone-pipeline/index.html
Keystone report can't have it both ways
By Sheldon Whitehouse and Henry A. Waxman
updated 7:46 AM EDT, Tue April 15, 2014
1341 Comments
Editor's note: Sheldon Whitehouse is a U.S. Democratic senator from Rhode Island, a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and chairman of the Committee's Clean Air and Nuclear Safety Subcommittee. Henry A. Waxman is a U.S. representative from California and the ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. He served as committee chairman from 2009-2010 and as chairman of the committee's Health and Environment Subcommittee from 1979-1994. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the authors.
(CNN) -- For all the noise about the State Department's final environmental review of the Keystone XL Pipeline being a "blow" to pipeline opponents, the report contains more than enough information for Secretary of State John Kerry -- a respected environmental champion -- to conclude that the pipeline is not in the national interest.
Although you have to dig a bit, the report recognizes the dangers associated with the tar sands fuel that the pipeline would transport.
Oil from tar sands spews 17% more greenhouse gas than the average crude oil refined in the United States. If the pipeline operates at capacity, that's as much carbon pollution as 5.7 million more cars driving on our roads. This is enough added pollution to erase as much as 70% of the carbon pollution reductions from the Obama administration's recent motor vehicle emission standards.
Using the Obama administration's estimates of the social cost of carbon, that adds up to $128 billion in climate costs over the lifetime of the project, costs that can too often be measured in parched farmland, compromised human health and property damage from floods.
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Keystone report can't have it both ways
By Sheldon Whitehouse and Henry A. Waxman
updated 7:46 AM EDT, Tue April 15, 2014
1341 Comments
Editor's note: Sheldon Whitehouse is a U.S. Democratic senator from Rhode Island, a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and chairman of the Committee's Clean Air and Nuclear Safety Subcommittee. Henry A. Waxman is a U.S. representative from California and the ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. He served as committee chairman from 2009-2010 and as chairman of the committee's Health and Environment Subcommittee from 1979-1994. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the authors.
(CNN) -- For all the noise about the State Department's final environmental review of the Keystone XL Pipeline being a "blow" to pipeline opponents, the report contains more than enough information for Secretary of State John Kerry -- a respected environmental champion -- to conclude that the pipeline is not in the national interest.
Although you have to dig a bit, the report recognizes the dangers associated with the tar sands fuel that the pipeline would transport.
Oil from tar sands spews 17% more greenhouse gas than the average crude oil refined in the United States. If the pipeline operates at capacity, that's as much carbon pollution as 5.7 million more cars driving on our roads. This is enough added pollution to erase as much as 70% of the carbon pollution reductions from the Obama administration's recent motor vehicle emission standards.
Using the Obama administration's estimates of the social cost of carbon, that adds up to $128 billion in climate costs over the lifetime of the project, costs that can too often be measured in parched farmland, compromised human health and property damage from floods.
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