Written by Bruce C. Smith
Gov. Mitch Daniels threw his endorsement behind construction of the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to the U.S. on Tuesday, saying opponents and the Obama administration should stop delaying the project.
He called the pipeline a "product of ingenuity" that can help power the country and create 20,000 badly needed jobs in the struggling economy. In Indiana, the BP refinery in Whiting, along Lake Michigan, is undergoing a $3.8 billion expansion so it can process more crude oil, including the heavy crude from Canada.
Daniels said opponents of the pipeline "are folks who want to see fossil fuels really, really expensive. They apparently believe that if it (high gas prices and lack of jobs) impoverishes the country, then so be it."
"There is no other way to describe (opposition to the pipeline) than as a pro-poverty policy," the Republican governor said, drawing applause from a mostly pro-pipeline crowd of U.S. and Canadian business leaders meeting at the Downtown Westin Hotel.
"A better acronym for the EPA might be the Employment Prevention Agency."
The Keystone XL is a proposed $7 billion pipeline nearly 2,000 miles long intended to carry oil extracted from sand and clay deposits near Alberta, Canada, to refineries in the U.S., including BP's Whiting refinery in Northwest Indiana.
The jobs-vs.-environment debate has followed the Keystone XL pipeline for several years, but the government's environmental studies have generally found the pipeline safe if it is operated according to the newest design standards that will be required.
Daniels and other supporters cast the project as a model for creating jobs, energizing the North American economy and ensuring national security by dealing with a friendly neighbor rather than a hostile Middle Eastern country for badly needed oil.
Opponents dispute the economic benefits. They fear the pipe will create environmental disasters and will encourage the country to remain tethered to dirty oil rather than develop wind, solar and other alternative green fuels.
"We are interested in many of the same goals, but we believe there are better ways," said Jesse Kharbanda, executive director of the Hoosier Environmental Council.
He said alternative fuels should be encouraged rather than continuing to rely on oil. He pointed to the leak this summer of 800,000 gallons of oil from a pipeline into a Michigan river as an example of the disasters waiting to happen.
At this week's pro-pipeline conference in Indianapolis, organized by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Petroleum Institute and other pipeline proponents, the governor was joined by API President Jack Gerard and Gary Goer, Canada's ambassador to the U.S., in calling on Washington to OK the project.
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