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Trump administration giving final green light to waving flagDakota Access pipeline

By Timothy Cama – 02/07/17 03:25 PM EST
URL of the original posting site: http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/318341-trump-admin-to-approve-dakota-access-oil-pipeline
Trump administration giving final green light to Dakota Access pipeline

The Army Corps of Engineers will grant the final approval needed to complete the controversial Dakota Access oil pipeline as soon as Wednesday, it told lawmakers Tuesday. The news from the Army Corps, in letters to Congress and to a federal judge in Washington, D.C., came two weeks after President Trump issued a memo asking the agency to approve the pipeline as soon as possible.

The Army Corps also told the court that it will no longer complete an intensive environmental impact statement on the pipeline, an action the Obama administration decided to take in December that would have delayed the project for potentially a year or more.

The decision is a major victory for pipeline developer Energy Transfer Partners and the oil industry and a defeat for environmentalists and the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Transfer told the federal judge Monday that that it could take as little as 60 days to finish the pipeline once it gets the Army Corps easement, Reuters reported.

The easement allows Energy Transfer to build the line under federally owned Lake Oahe in North Dakota. The pipeline, when complete, will run in North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois. Its construction is substantially complete, with the Lake Oahu portion behind the last major hurdle. The approval had been held up for months amid objections from the Standing Rock Sioux, whose reservation abuts the lake. The tribe said the pipeline threatens its water supply. The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe outlined its plans to fight against the pipeline in a statement on Tuesday, saying it would continue litigation against the project and urge policymakers in Washington oppose it.

“We are a sovereign nation and we will fight to protect our water and sacred places from the brazen private interests trying to push this pipeline through to benefit a few wealthy Americans with financial ties to the Trump administration,” tribal chairman David Archambault said in a statement.

Tribal lawyers have insisted Trump administration officials cannot overturn the December decision, and a lawyer for the tribe called such a decision “unlawful” during a Monday court hearing, according to Reuters. Standing Rock’s concerns blossomed into a months long protest with thousands of people from around the world at the construction site urging the federal government to cancel the project. It quickly became a flashpoint for environmentalists and indigenous-rights advocates, who accused the federal government of ignoring the Standing Rock Sioux’s objections.

But the oil industry and Republicans rallied behind Energy Transfer and said that former President Obama’s delays of the project threatened the rule of law.

Jan Hasselman, an attorney with Earthjustice who represents the Standing Rock tribe, said the Trump administration’s action is illegal and threatened court action over it.
“The Obama administration correctly found that the tribe’s treaty rights must be respected, and that the easement should not be granted without further review and consideration of alternative crossing locations. Trump’s reversal of that decision continues a historic pattern of broken promises to Indian tribes and a violation of treaty rights,” he said in a statement.Leftist Propagandist
“Trump and his administration will be held accountable in court.”
Devin Henry contributed to this story.

Updated: 6:03 p.m.

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FACT CHECK: Obama understates Keystone XL jobs


FILE - This March 22, 2012 file photo shows President Barack Obama arriving at the TransCanada Stillwater Pipe Yard in Cushing, Okla. Obama has revived debate about the number of jobs that would be created by the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas. The 1,700-mile pipeline would carry oil from tar sands in Alberta to refineries in the Houston area, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma. During a jobs speech Tuesday, July 30, 2013, in Tennessee, Obama downplayed the pipeline’s effect on jobs, calling it a "blip" compared to the overall economy. He also made that point during an interview with The New York Times last week.
FILE – This March 22, 2012 file photo shows President Barack Obama arriving at the TransCanada Stillwater Pipe Yard in Cushing, Okla. Obama has revived debate about the number of jobs that would be created by the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas. The 1,700-mile pipeline would carry oil from tar sands in Alberta to refineries in the Houston area, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma. During a jobs speech Tuesday, July 30, 2013, in Tennessee, Obama downplayed the pipeline’s effect on jobs, calling it a “blip” compared to the overall economy. He also made that point during an interview with The New York Times last week.

Pablo Martinez Monsivais, File / AP Photo

Associated Press

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama has revived debate about the number of jobs that would be created by the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas. The 1,700-mile pipeline would carry oil from tar sands in Alberta to refineries in the Houston area, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma.

During a jobs speech Tuesday in Tennessee, Obama downplayed the pipeline’s effect on jobs, calling it a “blip” compared with the overall economy. He also made that point in an interview with The New York Times last week.

The president correctly characterized the project’s overall effect on U.S. employment but underestimated the number of jobs it would create.

The $7 billion pipeline has become a contentious issue. Project supporters, including unions and lawmakers from both parties, tout the jobs it would create and demand its approval, while environmentalists urge the president to reject it, saying it would carry dirty, carbon-intensive oil.

The State Department expects to issue a final report later this year on whether the project should move forward. The department has authority over the pipeline because it crosses a U.S. border.

Asked Wednesday about the number of jobs that would be created by the pipeline, State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said, “The president was clearly stating the proposed Keystone XL project would have a negligible impact on the overall U.S. job market, which was the finding of the State Department” in a draft report last March.

A look at some of the president’s recent assertions on the pipeline and jobs and how they stack up:

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OBAMA: “Republicans have said that this would be a big jobs generator. There is no evidence that that’s true,” he said in The New York Times interview. “And my hope would be that any reporter who is looking at the facts would take the time to confirm that the most realistic estimates are this might create maybe 2,000 jobs during the construction of the pipeline — which might take a year or two — and then after that we’re talking about somewhere between 50 and 100 (chuckles) jobs in an economy of 150 million working people. … That is a blip relative to the need.”

THE FACTS: It’s not clear where Obama came up with the 2,000-jobs figure.

The project’s developer, Calgary-based TransCanada, has said the pipeline could create as many as 13,000 construction jobs — 6,500 a year over two years.

In its March report, the State Department put the number of construction jobs at 3,900 on an annual basis. That figure doesn’t include an estimated 4,000 workers that TransCanada says it has hired for a 485-mile southern segment of the pipeline that already is under construction and nearing completion.

Nor do the figures include the peripheral jobs that would be created as a result of a major infrastructure project.

TransCanada says about 7,000 manufacturing jobs will be needed to support the overall project, which will stretch from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

The State Department report goes further. It estimates that the project could help create — directly and indirectly — as many as 42,000 jobs, including jobs for suppliers and subcontractors that provide equipment and materials, as well as lodging, food services and other jobs related to construction. The figure includes part-time jobs.

The report said these jobs would amount to 0.02 percent of total U.S employment, a figure that is consistent with Obama’s characterization that the project would have minimal impact on the overall U.S. jobs picture.

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OBAMA: Republicans “keep on talking about this — an oil pipeline coming down from Canada that’s estimated to create about 50 permanent jobs. That’s not a jobs plan,” he said in Tennessee.

THE FACTS: Obama is on more solid ground with this assertion. The State Department report, citing figures provided by TransCanada, said there would be about 50 permanent jobs created along the route of the pipeline once it is completed. The report says the number of permanent jobs in the six affected states would have “negligible impacts” on the economy.

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Follow Matthew Daly on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MatthewDalyWDC

EDITOR’S NOTE – An occasional look at political claims that take shortcuts with the facts or don’t tell the full story.

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