President Obama rejected the Canadian company TransCanada’s to complete the Keystone XL pipeline
But In Texas, TransCanada’s pipeline remains a done deal.
- The southern leg of the Keystone XL project, renamed the Gulf Coast Pipeline, was constructed in 2012-13 and went into active service in January 2014.
- The Gulf Coast Pipeline carries a variety of petroleum products, including bitumen, often called tar sands crude oil.
In Northeast Texas, the pipeline then continues its path through the Piney Woods and finally to a refinery center in Port Arthur.
The rejection of the northern leg of the project is expected to have an indirect effect on the petroleum industry in Texas. Andy Lipow of Houston-based Oil Associates told Houston Public Media that bitumen from Alberta will have a circuitous journey before reaching the center in Cushing, Okla., that serves the Gulf South Pipeline.
“They’ll be disappointed up in Canada, because this would have been another avenue to move Canadian oil sands down to the U.S., and specifically further on down to refiners in the Gulf Coast,” Lipow said in a conversation with Houston Public Media’s Andrew Schneider. “On the other hand, the refiners on the Gulf Coast will be disappointed, because it makes it more expensive to move Canadian oil sands material to their refineries, and they may turn to more crude by rail.”
- TransCanada has left open the possibility that the company would try again to get a pipeline built from Alberta to the central U.S.
- “TransCanada and its shippers remain absolutely committed to building this important energy infrastructure project,” TransCanada CEO Russ Girling said.
The Gulf Coast Pipeline travels through parts of Fannin, Lamar, Delta, Hopkins, Franklin and Wood counties.
Credit StateImpact Texas
source ketr.org/post/transcanadas-pipeline-texas-remains-done-deal