{"id":14845,"date":"2013-06-26T16:02:57","date_gmt":"2013-06-26T21:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=14845"},"modified":"2013-06-26T16:02:57","modified_gmt":"2013-06-26T21:02:57","slug":"why-obamas-keystone-xl-climate-change-comments-confused-everyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2013\/06\/26\/why-obamas-keystone-xl-climate-change-comments-confused-everyone\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Obama\u2019s Keystone XL Climate Change Comments Confused Everyone"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_14846\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"President Barack Obama on June 25 spoke about efforts to reduce carbon pollution and the effects of climate change, to a crowd at Georgetown University.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2013\/06\/obama-climate-change.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-14846\" alt=\"President Barack Obama on June 25 spoke about efforts to reduce carbon pollution and the effects of climate change, to a crowd at Georgetown University.\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2013\/06\/obama-climate-change-300x199.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-media-credit\">MICHAEL REYNOLDS \/ Landov<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">President Barack Obama on June 25 spoke about efforts to reduce carbon pollution and the effects of climate change, to a crowd at Georgetown University.<\/p>\n<\/div><p>It\u2019s hard to know where President Barack Obama stands on the Keystone XL pipeline project, which still awaits his approval.<\/p><p>Obama has rejected Transcanada\u2019s permit for the Canada-to-Texas pipeline in the past, but championed parts of the project during a <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2012\/03\/22\/obama-is-in-cushing-to-put-oklahomas-pipeline-on-a-fast-track\/\">2012 trip to the pipeline\u2019s hub in Cushing<\/a>, Oklahoma.<\/p><p>And the president\u2019s climate change address at Georgetown University hasn\u2019t cleared anything up for either side of the Keystone cause. Big oil and environmentalists alike were puzzled, <em>USA Today<\/em>\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/theoval\/2013\/06\/26\/obama-keystone-oil-pipeline-climate-change-speech\/2459127\/\">David Jackson reports<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Some supporters of the proposed pipeline believe Obama signaled eventual approval; some opponents believe he previewed rejection.<\/p><\/blockquote><p><!--more-->Much of the Obama befuddlement centers on different interpretations of one part of his speech, writes<em> Forbes<\/em>\u2019 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/christopherhelman\/2013\/06\/25\/obama-declares-keystone-xl-will-be-approved\/\">staffer Christopher Helman<\/a>: &#8220;Obama said that the Keystone XL pipeline would only be approved if it &#8216;does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution.'&#8221;<\/p><p>\u201cExacerbate\u201d isn\u2019t exactly and exacting term, Helman writes.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>It means to aggravate, to sharpen, or to make a bad problem worse. The anti-Keystone crowd naturally thinks that the pipeline, or anything that aids in the transport of oil sands crude, would exacerbate carbon emissions. But that\u2019s not what the State Department found.<\/p><\/blockquote><p>Politico\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.politico.com\/story\/2013\/06\/obamas-keystone-remarks-cheer-supporters-and-foes-93375.html?hp=r5_b3\">Talia Buford focused<\/a> on another wiggly word: \u201csignificantly,\u201d and thinks the speech hinted at an eventual approval of the pipeline, which would transport crude from the tar sands of Albetra through Oklahoma to refineries on Texas\u2019 Gulf Coast.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8230; he announced what sounded like a daunting environmental threshold for the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline \u2014 that the project can\u2019t go forward if it would \u201csignificantly\u201d increase greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p><p>What he didn\u2019t mention: His own State Department has already indicated that the pipeline can meet that standard.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s hard to know where President Barack Obama stands on the Keystone XL pipeline project, which still awaits his approval.Obama has rejected Transcanada\u2019s permit for the Canada-to-Texas pipeline in the past, but championed parts of the project during a 2012 trip to the pipeline\u2019s hub in Cushing, Oklahoma.And the president\u2019s climate change address at Georgetown [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[490],"tags":[311,338],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14845"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14845"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14853,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14845\/revisions\/14853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}