{"id":11999,"date":"2015-01-08T10:26:33","date_gmt":"2015-01-08T15:26:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=11999"},"modified":"2015-01-08T10:37:49","modified_gmt":"2015-01-08T15:37:49","slug":"sabal-trail-like-keystone-xl-is-for-corporate-profit-not-jobs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/sabal-trail-like-keystone-xl-is-for-corporate-profit-not-jobs.html","title":{"rendered":"Sabal Trail like Keystone XL is for corporate profit not jobs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\nIt would go through our land to be sold everywhere else, with no jobs here. It wouldn&#8217;t even be a nominal benefit for those of us whose land, water, and taxes it would take.<\/p>\n<p>\nPresident Obama was half right:<\/p>\n<blockquote style=\"font-size:100%\">\n<p>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/sierraclub.typepad.com\/scrapbook\/2011\/11\/12000-surround-white-house-to-protest-tar-sands-pipeline.html\"><br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" style=\"float:right;border:none\" src=\"http:\/\/sierraclub.typepad.com\/.a\/6a00d83451b96069e2015436b4517e970c-800wi\"><\/a><br \/>\nUnderstand what this project is. It is providing the ability of<br \/>\nCanada to pump their oil, send it through our land, down to the<br \/>\nGulf, where it will be sold everywhere else. That doesn&#8217;t have an<br \/>\nimpact on U.S. gas prices.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nIn <a href=\"http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/the-press-office\/2014\/11\/14\/remarks-president-obama-and-daw-aung-san-suu-kyi-burma-joint-press-confe\"><br \/>\nhis press conference of 14 November 2014<\/a>,<br \/>\nhe was referring to the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline.<br \/>\nAdd Atlantic to Gulf and the above quote applies equally<br \/>\nto the proposed Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline.<\/p>\n<p>\nHistory has countered his next assertion:<!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote style=\"font-size:100%\">\n<p>\nYou know what does have an impact on U.S. gas prices is the<br \/>\nincredible boom in U.S. oil production and natural gas production<br \/>\nthat&#8217;s taken place under my administration.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nTwo weeks later, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2014\/11\/28\/us-opec-meeting-idUSKCN0JA0O320141128\">OPEC refused to cut oil production<\/a>, and U.S. gasoline prices plummetted, from<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.dispatch.com\/content\/stories\/business\/2015\/01\/03\/gas-prices-likely-to-stay-low-through-january.html\"><br \/>\n$3.00 in November to around $2.00 now<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\nNext president Obama said:<\/p>\n<blockquote style=\"font-size:100%\">\n<p>\nAnd if my Republican friends really want to focus on what&#8217;s good for<br \/>\nthe American people in terms of job creation and lower energy costs,<br \/>\nwe should be engaging in a conversation about what are we doing to<br \/>\nproduce even more homegrown energy. I&#8217;m happy to have that<br \/>\nconversation.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nSo let&#8217;s talk about solar and wind power.<br \/>\nThere are already<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2014\/11\/even-more-u-s-solar-jobs-than-in-coal-or-oil-and-gas-extraction.html\"><br \/>\nmore solar jobs than in non-supervisory oil and gas extraction<\/a>.<br \/>\nThe solar industry added more jobs than the wildest claims for Keystone XL<br \/>\nin a single year, while Keystone XL has been stuck without approval for six years.<br \/>\nGive it four or five more years, and solar jobs will outnumber <em>all<\/em><br \/>\noil and gas jobs, round about 2018, the same year solar energy production will pass oil energy production in the U.S.<br \/>\nAnd those projections were before OPEC crashed the price of oil to levels where<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.dailykos.com\/story\/2015\/01\/06\/1355814\/-97-of-fracking-now-operating-at-a-loss-at-current-oil-prices#?detail=facebook\">97% of fracking now is operating at a loss<\/a>.<br \/>\nThe Saudis may be aiming at Russia and Iran, but they&#8217;re also effectively<br \/>\ntaking down U.S. fracking.<\/p>\n<p>\nObama recently made<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2014\/11\/china-u-s-and-russia-energy-deals-bad-news-for-sabal-trail-fracked-methane-pipeline.html\"><br \/>\na historic deal with China to reduce greenhouse gas emissions<\/a>.<\/p>\n<blockquote style=\"font-size:100%\">\n<p>\nWith respect to the climate change deal, I have been very clear that<br \/>\nI have responsibilities as President not just to current<br \/>\ngenerations, but to future generations. The science is indisputable.<br \/>\nThe planet is getting warm, and it is getting warmer in part because<br \/>\nof man-made activity.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nAnd the release of carbon gases &mdash; carbon dioxide and<br \/>\ngreenhouse gases into the atmosphere can have a potentially<br \/>\ndevastating effect that will cost our country, could devastate<br \/>\ncommunities, could increase the impact of natural disasters, and<br \/>\nwill have an impact worldwide that is destabilizing and could affect<br \/>\nour national security. That&#8217;s not my opinion, by the way, that is<br \/>\nthe opinion of our Joint Chiefs of Staff, that climate change is a<br \/>\ndirect national security threat.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nOK, so stop promoting fracking, pipelines, and LNG export,<br \/>\nwhich leak methane at every step!<br \/>\nMethane is CH<small><sub>4<\/sub><\/small>, about which <a href=\"http:\/\/epa.gov\/climatechange\/ghgemissions\/gases\/ch4.html\">the EPA says<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote style=\"font-size:100%\">\n<p>\nPound for pound, the comparative impact of CH<small><sub>4<\/sub><\/small><br \/>\non climate change is<br \/>\nover 20 times greater than CO<small><sub>2<\/sub><\/small> over a 100-year period.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nThe responsible thing to do for<br \/>\ncurrent generations and future generations is to stop burning more<br \/>\nfossil fuels and to get on with solar and wind power.<br \/>\nThis Tuesday,<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/post-politics\/wp\/2015\/01\/06\/white-house-obama-would-veto-keystone-bill\/\">Obama&#8217;s press secretary said he would veto Keystone XL<\/a>.<br \/>\nThat&#8217;s a start!<br \/>\nNow let&#8217;s stop permitting fracked methane pipelines.<\/p>\n<p>\nIn his end-of-year 19 December 2014 press conference,<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/president-obama-keystone-xl-has-no-nominal-benefit-americans-293938\">president Obama was even more clear about Keystone XL<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\n&ldquo;At issue in Keystone is not American oil. It&#8217;s Canadian oil that&#8217;s<br \/>\ndrawn out of tar sands in Canada. That oil currently is being<br \/>\nshipped out through rail or trucks and it would save Canadian oil<br \/>\ncompanies and the Canadian oil industry an enormous amount of money<br \/>\nif they could simply pipe it all the way down to the Gulf,&rdquo;<br \/>\nObama said. &ldquo;Once that oil gets to the gulf, it is then<br \/>\nentering into the world market and it would be sold all around the<br \/>\nworld.&rdquo;\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nThe only difference with fracked methane is it mostly comes from the U.S. (damaging watersheds and taking people&#8217;s land) before it gashes its way to the sea<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/spectrabusters.org\/lng-export\/\">for export<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\nHe added:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\n&ldquo;It&#8217;s very good for Canadian oil companies, and it&#8217;s good for<br \/>\nthe Canadian oil industry, but it&#8217;s not going to be a huge benefit<br \/>\nto U.S. consumers, it&#8217;s not even going to be a nominal benefit to<br \/>\nU.S. consumers,&rdquo; he continued.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nObama also noted that the pipeline will create a few thousand jobs,<br \/>\nbut emphasized that they will mostly be temporary construction<br \/>\npositions that will disappear after construction is complete. A<br \/>\nreport from the State Department earlier this year concluded that<br \/>\nKeystone XL would create only 35 permanent jobs.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\nJust like Sabal Trail&#8217;s spurious claims of jobs that they never back up because<br \/>\nthey can&#8217;t: almost all of the jobs would go to contractors from somewhere else<br \/>\nwho would pass through in their RVs, leaving a trail of destruction.<\/p>\n<p>\nSolar is<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/solar-boom-charts.html\"><br \/>\nbooming already<\/a>, and will win soon anyway.<br \/>\nThere&#8217;s no excuse for tearing down trees on a hundred-foot right of way<br \/>\nfor a fracked methane pipeline, or drilling under rivers, or taking people&#8217;s land, or burning CH<small><sub>4<\/sub><\/small>.<\/p>\n<p>\nLet&#8217;s stop the oil and gas and nuclear boondoggles and get on with<br \/>\nhelping the sun rise.<\/p>\n<p>\n -jsq<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It would go through our land to be sold everywhere else, with no jobs here. It wouldn&#8217;t even be a nominal benefit for those of us whose land, water, and taxes it would take. President Obama was half right: Understand what this project is. It is providing the ability of Canada to pump their oil, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47,141,16,50,203,8,2,6124,559,6687,22,73,289,55],"tags":[937,398,8719,8745,8701,8699,8702,12,7,562,8782,6076,8712,2457,6],"class_list":["post-11999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-climate-change","category-co2","category-environment","category-epa","category-florida","category-georgia","category-government","category-natural-gas-2","category-oil","category-pipeline-2","category-politics","category-safety","category-science","category-water","tag-barack-obama","tag-china","tag-climate-change","tag-co2","tag-georgia","tag-government","tag-lake","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-natural-gas","tag-oil","tag-pipeline","tag-politics","tag-saudi-arabia","tag-valdosta"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11999"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11999\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12003,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11999\/revisions\/12003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}