Tornado Alley (PROG)

[SoxFan]

Keystone Pipeline Sheds a Tear, Literally

Original pipeline spills for at least the 13th time, making it most successful thing George W. Bush ever approved

April 5, 2016

About 187 gallons of crude oil spilled out of the original Keystone Pipeline in South Dakota over the weekend, reminding America that oil doesn’t need to be used properly to cause damage.

But Transcanada, the energy giant who operates the giant tube, says don’t worry because “no significant impact to the environment has been observed,” besides the fact that 150,000 penguins in Antarctica have died in six years, likely thanks to climate change.

This is a tiny spill compared to, say, the reported 4.2 million gallons of crude now sweetening the Gulf of Mexico thanks to the Deep Water Horizon spill and the half a million gallons a day it ships from Alberta to Illinois. In its first year after George W. Bush approved the original pipeline in 2008 it leaked 12 times, making it the most successful thing George W. Bush did in 2008.

The pipeline is now shut down as the DOT’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Administration investigates the accident and billions of volts of energy from the sun and wind spill all over the nation causing sunburns and an occasional chapped lip.

You may remember the Keystone XL Pipeline, which would carry 830,000 gallons of Alberta tar sands oil a day as the GOP’s jobs plan — or its “35 permanent jobs” plan, since that’s how many jobs would be created once the entirety of the proposed pipeline is completed.

After six years of review, President Obama finally rejected TransCanada’s permit last year. The energy giant is now suing the U.S. under NAFTA’s “I Thought We All Agreed the Planet Was Screwed” clause.

This is a nice reminder that “as pipelines age, they are often not properly maintained, leading to a greater possibility of a leak occurring.”

TransCanada claims to have a high-tech network of signals to alert it of spills, except in this case the rupture was noticed by a local landowner who quickly realized that he was not living out the beginning of the Beverly Hillbillies.

http://www.cafe.com/keystone-pipeline-delivers-providing-south-dakota-free-oil/