WASHINGTON, DC - Today the State Department published in the Federal Register the Notice of Intent (NOI) to prepare a Supplemental EIS (SEIS) for the second Keystone XL Presidential Permit application. The SEIS will supplement the State Department’s FIES issued last August, which found the pipeline will have limited adverse environmental impacts. Instead of limiting the review solely to the new Nebraska segment of the pipeline, the State Department will conduct a new compliance review of the National Historic Preservation Act and assess an undetermined number of additional subjects.
Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) issued the following statement.
“With its proposed supplemental review, the Obama administration is taking yet another step farther away from energy security and job creation. By not limiting the scope of the review to just the new Nebraska segment, the entire project could become tangled in unnecessary review and red tape, and subjected to attacks and stalling tactics by opponents of this job-creating project. The State Department already found the pipeline to be environmentally sound after an exhaustive three-year review. This action by the State Department is surprising given Hillary Clinton’s statements nearly two years ago that she was inclined to approve the pipeline, and the administration’s own assurances that the pipeline’s review should be concluded by the end of 2011. The U.S. is already consuming about a million barrels of Canadian oil each day, and four years is too long to wait for construction of this pipeline to fortify that energy partnership. Americans are paying nearly double what they were paying for gas when President Obama was inaugurated.
“Referencing the pipeline’s southern leg, the president said earlier this year that he wanted to ‘cut through the red tape’ and ‘break through the bureaucratic hurdles.’ The State Department’s proposed review does exactly the opposite and could threaten construction of the entire pipeline. By continuing to delay this project, the president is putting thousands of American jobs at risk and jeopardizing our access to this valuable North American oil supply."
