Rogers' support of Keystone XL is about fear mongering; disregard for environment

01/19/12- Rogers' support of Keystone XL is about fear mongering; disregard for environment

LANSING-- Democratic candidate for the 8th Congressional District Lance Enderle today slammed Congressman Mike Rogers (R-Brighton) for his support of the ill-fated Canadian Keystone XL pipeline project.
The project would have traversed 1,200 miles of American soil, often in environmentally sensitive areas including a major aquifer, to transport tar sands oil from Canada to Texas. The oil in question is environmentally dangerous to remove from the earth, requiring massive amounts of water, steam and heat to remove, and must be mixed with other, lighter oil products to be transported under high pressure in pipelines. The oil is also tainted with toxic heavy metals like mercury.
The Obama administration on Wednesday announced it would reject the proposal for the pipeline. The move has been heavily criticized by Republicans, including GOP Rep. Tim Walberg, who represents Michigan's 7th which suffered thelargest environmental disaster in midwest history in July of 2010. At that time, the Enbridge Energy Partners Lakehead Pipeline 6B burst open spewing an estimated 1.1 million gallons of toxic tar sands oil and the petroleum "diluent" into the Talmadge Creek and the Kalamazoo River. Cleanup continues from the spill, with the company and the EPA having trouble removing a heavy tar-like substance left behind from the spill which is now covering acres of the bottom of the river.
On his Facebook page, Rogers called the Obama administration decision "short-sighted," claiming the move will "force" Canada to sell it's toxic oils sands product to China, and enrich Iran in the process.
"Evidently, Mike has no clue about the internal politics of Canada," said Enderle. "The First Nations of Canada have been very clear -- they won't allow pipelines to traverse their tribal lands, which would be necessary to fill tankers on the Pacific coast to tank over to China. And why do they oppose this? Because they know what residents of Calhoun County discovered in 2010 -- oil sands oil is toxic, dangerous and nearly impossible to remove from the environment."
"To claim that somehow Iran will ultimately be the beneficiary of Canadian oil to China is ridiculous on its face," Enderle continued. "China is currently getting oil from Iran, and getting more oil from Canada will simply reduce the demand for Iranian oil, reducing Iranian oil money. Mike is scare mongering."
"And all those jobs Mike is talking about? How many of them are 'indirect' jobs created by toxic, life-changing spills caused by improper handling of this toxic goo?" Enderle asked. "Yes we need jobs, but more jobs produced by scraping the bottom of the proverbial barrel of oil production helps no one, and makes the U.S. put off the important job of leading the world into the development of renewable energy sources which do not cause environmental catastrophes.”