Saturday, November 12, 2011

Keystone XL pipeline - the future of oil dependency

The Keystone XL pipeline decision has been placed on hold until the end of next year. The will limit the amount of oil that can come from the vast Canadian tar sands reserves. We will continue to be dependent on distant oil. Of course, there are environmental issues which have to be addressed but an energy policy has to be base don multiple sources of oil. 

Canadian tar sands are expensive oil with the break-even costs at about $60 per barrel. Those will go up once the easy sands near the surface are used, but at current prices this is a viable and useful source of energy. Not building the pipeline will place stress on the global oil infrastructure. Canada now has the second largest reserves next to Saudi Arabia. It is a natural and a likely better source relative to deep off-shore oil

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