The new Congress first bill in 2015

[Jangle]

according to Mitch McConnell is to pass a "bipartisan" job creation bill.....The Keystone Pipeline. Koch Brothers need to cash in.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/energyso...y-keystone-xl/

A State Department study projects only 35 permanent jobs in pipeline maintenance and inspection. Although it seems likely that the Keystone XL Pipeline’s application will eventually be approved by the Obama Administration, firmer numbers will not be available until the project gets underway.

[Jangle]

Critics of the pipeline are fond of saying it would carry “the dirtiest oil on the planet,” and there is no question that the oil is significantly “dirtier” than most in the sense that it results in more greenhouse gas emissions.

It comes from Alberta and parts of Saskatchewan, in what the industry calls “oil sands” and environmentalist critics call “tar sands.” By either name, they are vast deposits of bitumen — a form of petroleum so dense that at a temperature of 52 degrees Fahrenheit it is “hard as a hockey puck,” according to the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. It must be heated or diluted to be made to flow through pipes.

The bitumen is found mixed with sand and clay. Extracting it requires a good deal of energy — either through open-pit mining from surface deposits or by injecting steam into deeper, “in situ” (in place) sites. Refining it into useful fuels also requires more energy — and hence more emissions — than lighter forms of petroleum.

How much “dirtier” is it? The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service surveyed published scientific literature on the subject, and those studies found variously that getting Canadian bitumen produced and processed into fuel produces between 70 percent and 110 percent more greenhouse gas emissions than the weighted average of transportation fuels now used in the U.S. That’s what’s called a “well-to-tank” figure, the measure preferred by critics.
http://www.factcheck.org/2014/03/pipeline-primer/

[Islandman]

Will be interesting to see how much interest there will still be in this if oil prices stays in the $50-$60 a barrel price range for an extended period.

[Assasin]

The thing is with the recent oil boom in the US, will this be beneficial to America? Will this affect the American oil production? You notice OPEC is not changing output to accept price? I think they want to stall the American current boom.

[Islandman]

They do, but they are not friends of Russia either so dem licking more than one bird with this stone. OPEC want to maintain their influence over the market and they can't do it with so many producers out there.

They are living on borrowed time though, the drilling technology will continue to get better as will alternative energy technologies.