Heads in the sand

While I don’t agree with the motivations behind President Barack Obama’s decision earlier this month to reject the Keystone XL pipeline, and I do like Batman, I still disagree with Will Gryna’s Jan. 26 column, “Crude Keystone Lite.”

Like Gryna, I believe Obama’s decision to reject the pipeline was purely political.

Obama essentially admitted to this himself, saying the decision was made not based on environmental or economic reasons, but because Republicans in Congress imposed a “rushed and arbitrary deadline” that didn’t give Obama ample time to think it over.

In fact, the rejection is not even a closed case; the White House made it clear to TransCanada, the company proposing the pipeline, that it could reapply for a permit to construct the pipeline.

TransCanada plans to do so, with a goal of finishing the pipeline by 2014.

While environmentalists praise Obama for this purely political and possibly temporary decision, conservatives are criticizing him for failing to engage in shortsighted and short-lived economic activity.

Although I understand where Gryna’s article is coming from, there are some serious blemishes in his argument that need to be addressed.

First of all, the claim that rejection of the pipeline now means that all the oil that would have been going to the United States will now be going to China is largely speculation.

As mentioned earlier, TransCanada actually plans to continue to pursue the American market.

Gryna also asserts that the pipeline would have “environmental benefits” and would be “more efficient than most people realize,” and that the pipeline is not as horribly dangerous as many scientists and politicians would lead us to believe.

Not only is any energy derived from oil incredibly destructive to the environment, but tar-sands oil production is in fact one of the most energy-intensive, inefficient and dirtiest methods of oil production on the planet.

To be made commercially viable, large quantities of natural gas must be used to cook the oil sands to separate and process the oil, thus utilizing excessive energy to access more energy.

Gryna alleges that the Keystone XL pipeline would actually reduce greenhouse gases because the oil would be piped rather than internationally transported, but because of the extremely energy-intensive processing necessary to actually extract any usable oil from tar sands, this argument does not hold.

Moreover, Gryna contends that, because pollution and other environmental damage caused by the pipeline would allegedly be a very marginal increase based on the current energy consumption habits of the U.S., it is simply ridiculous not to construct the pipeline.

This is a defeatist attitude that seems to reject any possibility of changing not only the way we consume energy, but also the way we think about consumption, the environment and our relationship to the Earth.

If the U.S. ends up installing the Keystone XL pipeline, it will be missing the opportunity to take steps toward innovative renewable energy and job creation from alternative energy sources.

Unlike many of the jobs that would be generated by construction of the pipeline, these jobs would be more likely to be viable in the long-term.

We do need oil: It is the foundation of our current economy, and we simply can’t deny that vital need.

But we also can’t deny our responsibility to future generations, the Earth and, by default, our own long-term interests.

To have an economy and culture that are sustainable for many years into the future, we need insight and a vision that is more far-sighted than the current politically-fueled ideology of unthinking consumption.

­— ccleahy@indiana.edu