Down goes the Keystone XL pipeline
The Keystone XL pipeline has lingered over three presidencies – being a regular source of tension between President Obama and congressional Republicans who lied about how many jobs it would create, and then being greenlit under Donald Trump’s presidency where it was largely exposed for the fraud that it was. President Biden then inherited it with his new administration but refused to buy into the right wing deception and denied the pipeline’s contractors a key permit that would have allowed construction on the northern border with Canada.
On Wednesday, the Canadian company TC Energy along with the provincial government of Alberta announced that the Keystone XL project was officially dead, bringing an end to a decades long issue that would have only added a few dozen permanent jobs at best and led to a considerable number of spills. President Biden may not necessarily get a whole lot of credit for what just happened, but TC Energy’s decision was inevitable after he revoked their permit, and it gives a prime opportunity for Democrats to push through their plans for infrastructure and promote clean energy jobs at a critical time for Congress and the Biden administration, at a time when they are needed the most. It’s not necessarily the end of the age of Big Oil, but it’s a crucial first step towards the end of its influence on politics and the economy.
James Sullivan is the assistant editor of Brain World Magazine and an advocate of science-based policy making