Speaker: Canadian oil important to U.S.

News
October 9, 2012
By Robert Pore
 
America’s need for more energy to fuel economic growth was addressed by Matt Koch, vice president of the Institute for 21st Century Energy, in remarks delivered Tuesday at a Partnership to Fuel America event in Grand Island.
 
The Partnership to Fuel America was initiated by the Institute for 21st Century Energy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Its message is that America needs more energy, including oil and natural gas, to fuel the nation’s economy and provide consumers with an affordable fuel supply. One step it promotes is completion of the TransCanada Keystone oil pipeline through the U.S., including Nebraska.
 
The pipeline project, which will carry tar sand extracted oil from Canada to refineries in the U.S., has been controversial in Nebraska as part of the proposed pipeline route crosses the Ogallala aquifer in Nebraska’s Sandhills.
 
“We, as a country, are very reliant on Canada for energy,” Koch said.
 
Canada was the largest exporter of oil to the U.S. last year, with nearly 30 percent of U.S. imported oil coming from Canada. The United States spent more than $433 billion on crude oil and petroleum imports in 2011. The value of oil imports from Canada was $52.522 billion in 2011.
 
Koch said the primary goal of the Partnership to Fuel America is to inform citizens that Canada is the largest supplier of oil to the U.S.
 
“Businesses, in particular, need to understand that,” Koch said. “We also need to get businesses more engaged in communicating that to business. People need to know that we have this great relationship, and we need to grow it as they are developing more oil and energy resources, along with innovative ways to get oil out of the ground.”
 
He said Canada is a “steady ally, a neighbor and a great trade partner.”
 
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Canada is America’s largest trade partner, with more than $360 billion in trade for 2012 as of July. A large part of that trade value is in the oil the U.S. imports from Canada.
 
“They share similar views and values that we have in the United States,” Koch said. “For every barrel of oil that we develop here in the United States or in Canada, we are importing less from some other country in the world that may not have our best interests in mind.”
 
Another value of the TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline is that it will be able to deliver oil from North Dakota. North Dakota is the second leading state in oil production next to Texas.
 
“A big part of our message, as well, is that this pipeline will not only help bring crude in from Canada, but also enable us to clear what has become a bottleneck of oil in North Dakota, to get it to refineries in the United States,” Koch said.
 
Another message of the Partnership to Fuel America deals with diversification of the supply of energy from stable and reliable sources in the U.S.
 
“We need an ‘all of the above’ energy policy of not only oil, coal and gas, but there is a role for alternatives, such as wind, solar and biofuels,” Koch said. 
 
“There is also a need for efficiencies to be found that will help with the economy as well.”
 
According to the Partnership to Fuel America, “the development of additional sources of North American energy will create and preserve thousands of jobs and strongly benefit U.S. energy security and our nation’s economy.”
 
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the U.S. will require 21 percent more energy in 2035 than in 2009.
 
And that need to meet those energy demands, Koch said, is why it is important that the U.S. benefits from further development of Canadian natural resources that provide the U.S. with 1.9 million barrels of oil a day.
 
“If we can develop and utilize these resources, we can be innovative in all energy sectors and we may have a chance to become energy self-sufficient,” Koch said. “By utilizing Canadian imports, we are moving in that direction.”