Keystone XL Pipeline
Floor Speech
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Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from
South Dakota for organizing the colloquy and I also thank the good Senator from Nebraska for joining us as well. I appreciate working with them on this project, which is not only vital to our State but to our country.
As the Senator from South Dakota said, this project is critically important to our country for a number of reasons. First, it will create tens of thousands of jobs. There will be a $7 billion investment, not one penny of which will be Federal Government spending but all private sector investment. The Perryman Group projected, when they did a study on the job creation, that it would create 20,000 construction jobs right away; it would create upward of 100,000 spinoff jobs as they expand refineries and with the other economic activity that is created. Some might dispute those job numbers, but any way we look at it, tens of thousands of jobs will be created by the private sector, which is why it has strong union support at a time when we have 13-plus million people out of work and we need the jobs.
As the Senator from South Dakota said, it will generate hundreds of millions in tax revenues from a growing economy, from more economic activity. The last I checked, it is pretty important at the local, State, and Federal levels to have those revenues coming in. In addition, it will reduce our dependence on oil from the Middle East. With what is going on in Iran--and they are threatening to blockade the Strait of Hormuz--and with gas prices at $3.50 a gallon, roughly, and going up, it is important to consumers and the businesses of this country that we use the oil in this country and from our closest ally, Canada, rather than relying on the Middle East.
The third point is, this oil will be produced. If we don't build the pipeline capacity to bring it to our refineries to be refined, it goes to China. That is a fact. It will be produced. It will either go to China or it will come to us.
I have this chart to give a history of the project because, as the good Senator from South Dakota said, this has been under review for more than 3 years. TransCanada, the company that is trying to build the pipeline, built this Keystone Pipeline already. That is this red line on the chart. That project was approved in 2 years. Again, Keystone XL has been under study more than 3 years. The sister pipeline has already been built, and that was approved in 2 years. It comes from Alberta, Canada, to the refineries in the Patoka, IL, area.
The existing project, as we can see, comes through North Dakota--that was when I was Governor--through South Dakota, and down through Nebraska. The Keystone XL comes just to the west. I point that out because of the Bakken oil play in North Dakota and Montana, it is very important we have the ability to put oil into this pipeline. We are looking at putting 100,000 barrels a day of U.S. crude into this pipeline so it can get to our refineries. In other words, it is not just about bringing Canadian crude to our refineries; it is about bringing our own crude to them. It also saves wear and tear on our roads, and it is a safety issue because it reduces truck traffic. We are talking 500 truckloads a day and 17 million truck miles a year that we don't have to put on our roads. We don't have to have the traffic issues, the safety issues or the road issues in our country because we have the ability to move the product with this pipeline.
Let's look at this timeline. September, 2008. I know this is hard to read. I will make an important point. In September 2008, TransCanada applied for a permit for the Keystone XL Pipeline. In November of 2008, the current administration was elected. For the entire time the current administration has been in office, they have held up this project. It has gone through the full NEPA process. It had the full environmental impact studies done. Even the State Department said there would be a decision before the end of last year. For the entire time this administration has been in office, TransCanada was working to go through the process with EPA and the Department of State, and the Department of State said they would have a decision before the end of last year, but we still don't have a decision. We have to ask why. Why don't we have a decision? That is what we are talking about. It is long past time to act.
Let's look at this chart. What are we talking about? What we are talking about is this--another pipeline. We are talking about another pipeline just like the one that has already been built. How about the hundreds or maybe I should say thousands of pipelines we already have, and somehow we cannot build this pipeline? That doesn't make any sense. Somebody needs to explain this to us.
We have legislation, with 45 Senators, 45 sponsors, who are saying: Hey, it is time to move forward and build the project. As a matter of fact, we are doing everything we can to address any and all problems or concerns the administration has raised.
That is why I am going to turn it over now to my good colleague from Nebraska, because when the administration says there is an issue or a State or the EPA says there is an issue, we stepped up in our legislation and solved it. We say: Great, let's address it, but let's move forward for the good of our economy and the good of our country.
I defer now to the good Senator from Nebraska.
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Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from South Dakota again for organizing this colloquy this morning. I thank him and the esteemed Senator from Nebraska for their support of this legislation.
Again, we have taken a problem-solving approach to this legislation, and we are continuing to do that. We will continue to work with other Members of the Senate and our colleagues in the House, but we need the administration to engage with us on this important issue for the good of the American people.
Again, I thank my colleague from South Dakota.
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