Keystone XL is a pipeline that will carry crude oil from Alberta, Canada’s tar sand oil reserves to Nebraska and Texas where the crude oil will be refined. This pipeline was first proposed in 2005 by the TransCanada Corporation, and the extension that we know as Keystone XL was proposed in 2008 where its purpose was to increase American jobs in the Midwest as well as decrease our dependence on foreign oil supplies. This pipeline has been surrounded by controversy since the genesis of the proposal. In 2010 the Environmental Protection Agency postponed the project because the environmental impact study was inadequate and did not properly look into oil spill response plans, greenhouse gas effects, and safety of the pipeline. Not only has the pipeline
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It will be passing over the The Northern High Plains Aquifer which supplies roughly 78% of Nebraska’s water supply and irrigates 30% of US agriculture (Gasser et al. 2012). This is not an expendable pond, it is an incredibly important and sensitive region that must be properly taken care of to ensure the viability of the entire state. If the Keystone XL pipeline were to crack a leak it could permanently destroy the water supply, displace tens of thousands of Americans, and possibly kill many species of plants and animals. TransCanada has said that they have implemented a leak detection system into the pipeline and said that there are numerous plans to ensure that a major spill would not happen. However, their system only detects a leak when there is a drop of more than 1% of flow in the pipeline (Gasser et al. 2012) which means, there could be a small leakage that leaks up to 9,000 barrels of oil a day and their system would not recognize that a spill is occuring. Even worse, this part of the pipeline could be in a remote location where no one could witness the spill and an incredible amount of oil could leak into the water supply. This pipeline issue is one of the more hypothetical, but why risk precious resources such as water, that supplies a very large number of species and people for an outdated form of energy that will most likely be abandoned in several
It will be passing over the The Northern High Plains Aquifer which supplies roughly 78% of Nebraska’s water supply and irrigates 30% of US agriculture (Gasser et al. 2012). This is not an expendable pond, it is an incredibly important and sensitive region that must be properly taken care of to ensure the viability of the entire state. If the Keystone XL pipeline were to crack a leak it could permanently destroy the water supply, displace tens of thousands of Americans, and possibly kill many species of plants and animals. TransCanada has said that they have implemented a leak detection system into the pipeline and said that there are numerous plans to ensure that a major spill would not happen. However, their system only detects a leak when there is a drop of more than 1% of flow in the pipeline (Gasser et al. 2012) which means, there could be a small leakage that leaks up to 9,000 barrels of oil a day and their system would not recognize that a spill is occuring. Even worse, this part of the pipeline could be in a remote location where no one could witness the spill and an incredible amount of oil could leak into the water supply. This pipeline issue is one of the more hypothetical, but why risk precious resources such as water, that supplies a very large number of species and people for an outdated form of energy that will most likely be abandoned in several