Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire hussein obama Screwing America Via Keystone!

As I understand the issue, the Nebraska supreme Court is considering a suit affecting the routing of the Keystone Pipeline; until the Court rules, it would be premature to issue the permits. If the Nebraska Court orders a re-routing, it would cause even more disruption if construction began under the current situation.

I agree with what has been said. I would like to add that the Bakken oil field production has the railroads overworked and backlogged:



"OIL TRAINS SLOWING DOWN OTHER TRAINS

(Wall St. Journal 3/13/2014, thanks to Paul Scheible)


A major snarl in railroad traffic is ricocheting through the supply chains of businesses across the U.S., causing delays and losses for shippers of goods ranging from coal to sugar. Although many railroads are involved, much of the problem originates with pileups at BNSF Railway Co. where it is shipping crude oil from North Dakota's booming Bakken Shale region. The railroad was already taxed by the heavy demand for oil transport but its difficulties multiplied when it ran out of locomotives and crew as a bitter winter forced it to use smaller trains and they were also hit with a larger than expected grain harvest. This caused a ripple effect across the country as shipments have been delayed. Deliveries of empty grain cars to farmers and grain elevators in the Midwest and Great Plains are running about two to three weeks late, the railroad says. Coal-fired power plant inventories are running much lower than the usual 30 days. "The railroads tell us they aren't serving power plants until their inventories are in single-digit days," said one power company executive. The backlogs could wind up costing shippers hundreds of millions of dollars, says Steve Sharp, president of Consumers United for Rail Equity, a group representing agriculture companies, manufacturers and utilities. Andrew Walmsley, director of congressional relations for the American Farm Bureau Federation, worries that continued capacity problems could hurt U.S. competitiveness in the world arena. BNSF is leasing and buying locomotives by the hundreds and hiring new crews. In mid-February, it took the unusual course of building new track on top of frozen snow-covered ground along its main oil-patch route. Some shippers, eager to move their products, have opted to use trucks. Trucking rates compare with rail costs within a 500-mile radius, but beyond that companies can wind up paying four to five times as much on a per-ton basis, says one shipping official."