State Department Sticks Another Fork In Keystone XL Pipeline

Reposted from CleanTechnica:

As Yogi Berra would say, it ain’t over ’til it’s over, but as far as the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline is concerned, you might as well stick a fork in it: it’s done. Capping off a run of bad news for the ultimate “dirty fuel” project, last Friday the State Department presented a strong indication that its support for the Keystone XL project is in serious jeopardy. Earlier this year, if you may recall, State issued an environmental impact statement favorable to the project, but now our friends over at The Hill have confirmed that the agency’s internal watchdog has launched an investigation into the consultant that prepared the document.

The gist of the inquiry is a conflict of interest alleged by several environmental groups, which uncovered a linkage between the consultant and the American Petroleum Institute, which lobbies on behalf of the oil industry, as well as financial ties to the pipeline developer.

Bad New For The Keystone XL Pipeline

For those of you new to the topic, the Keystone XL Pipeline is a proposed pipeline under the ownership of the Canadian company TransCanada. It would transport diluted bitumen (aka dilbit) from tar sands oil fields in Canada down through the heartland of the US, to Gulf Coast refineries for the export market.

Read more at CleanTechnica.