{"id":3870,"date":"2011-12-30T12:06:48","date_gmt":"2011-12-30T18:06:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=3870"},"modified":"2012-01-02T12:05:49","modified_gmt":"2012-01-02T18:05:49","slug":"where-not-to-put-the-keystone-xl-pipeline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/12\/30\/where-not-to-put-the-keystone-xl-pipeline\/","title":{"rendered":"Where Not to Put the Keystone XL Pipeline"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3875\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 220px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/122173040.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3875\" title=\"A protester uses a megaphone to shout sl\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/122173040-300x409.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"220\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/122173040-300x409.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/122173040-220x300.jpg 220w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/122173040.jpg 435w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 220px) 100vw, 220px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Photo by Mladen Antonov\/AFP\/Getty Images)<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\"> <\/p><\/div>\n<p>The Canadian company behind the proposed <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/tag\/keystone-xl-pipeline\/\">Keystone XL pipeline<\/a>, which would bring crude from the country&#8217;s oil sands to refineries in Texas, got a little gift to end out the year from the Nebraska government this week: a map of where not to put the pipeline.<\/p>\n<p>The pipeline ran into a snag earlier this year after Nebraska lawmakers opposed the route planned by the company, TransCanada, which would have gone through an environmentally-sensitive region known as the Nebraska Sandhills. The Sandhills are home to a giant freshwater aquifer that is used for water supply.\u00a0(The pipeline also met with opposition from several environmental groups, who said it would increase reliance on fossil fuels.)<\/p>\n<p>The ground is so thin in some parts of the area that groundwater on occasion rises to the surface. Water there is used primarily for irrigation, but it&#8217;s also used for drinking water by some 2 million people, according to the <a href=\"http:\/\/co.water.usgs.gov\/nawqa\/hpgw\/factsheets\/DENNEHYFS1.html\">US Geological Survey<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Nebraska lawmakers passed legislation in November saying an alternative route that avoids the Sandhills must be found in order for the project to go forward. With the release of this map, it seems Nebraska wants to give the pipeline company that opportunity.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The magic number for the pipeline these days is sixty: just sixty miles of pipeline that have to be re-routed around the sand hills region of Nebraska (or about 3.5 percent of the entire project, which would total 1,700 miles), and just sixty days for the Obama administration to make a decision on it.<\/p>\n<div class=\"related-content alignleft\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/11\/11\/does-the-keystone-pipeline-delay-actually-hurt-green-energy\/\">Does the Keystone Pipeline Delay Actually Hurt Green Energy?<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/11\/18\/in-texas-confidence-that-tar-sands-crude-will-find-a-way-to-the-gulf\/\">In Texas, Confidence that Tar Sands Crude Will Find a Way to the\u00a0Gulf<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/12\/19\/what-is-going-on-with-the-keystone-xl-pipeline\/\">What is Going On with the Keystone XL Pipeline?<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/12\/27\/where-the-keystone-xl-pipeline-stalled-the-sands-of-nebraska\/\">Where the Keystone XL Pipeline Stalled: the Sands of Nebraska<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><img class=\"alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/131643233-60x60.jpg\" height=\"60\" width=\"60\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/topic\/keystone-xl-pipeline\/\">What is the Keystone XL Pipeline?<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>\n<p>If a route can be found around or through the sand hills, <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2011\/12\/27\/where-the-keystone-xl-pipeline-stalled-the-sands-of-nebraska\/\">it&#8217;s possible the project could be approved<\/a>.\u00a0A spokesperson for TransCanada\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/thechronicleherald.ca\/business\/46109-keystone-xl-start-may-be-near-transcanada-corp-says#.Tvn4N8E1tBU.twitter\">told the\u00a0The Canadian Press<\/a>\u00a0Tuesday\u00a0that the sand hills section is the only one that needs to be figured out, as the rest of the pipeline has virtually been approved.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s not overriding some environmental review that has to take place,&#8221; TransCanada spokesperson Shawn Howard told the news agency, &#8220;It\u2019s not changing that review. This bill was carefully crafted, it respected that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>That bill he&#8217;s referring to is the one passed by the U.S. Congress last week and signed by the president to extend the payroll tax cut and\u00a0force a decision by the Obama administration on the pipeline within sixty days. TransCanada says the bill\u00a0speeds up the construction process. And now the company has an exact idea of what areas they must avoid.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously, the applicant cannot propose the route without knowing the area to be avoided,\u201d Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality (NDEQ) Director Mike Linder said <a href=\"http:\/\/www.deq.state.ne.us\/\">in a statement announcing the release of the map<\/a>. \u201cNDEQ has been reviewing available information and has selected a map of ecoregions which was finalized in 2001 as best depicting the Sandhills region.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the map from the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality (NDEQ). The yellow shading represents the Sandhills region:<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3872\"  class=\"wp-caption module image center\" style=\"max-width: 620px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"This map shows areas the Keystone Pipeline must avoid\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/sand-hills.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-large wp-image-3872\" title=\"sand hills\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/sand-hills-620x401.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"620\" height=\"401\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/sand-hills-620x401.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/sand-hills-300x194.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/sand-hills-220x142.jpg 220w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/sand-hills.jpg 899w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Map by Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">This map shows areas the Keystone Pipeline must avoid<\/p><\/div>\n<p>It appears at a glance that there is a gap for the pipeline to go through that could meet the requirements of the Nebraska government. Now it&#8217;s up to TransCanada to use this map and submit an alternate route for consideration, the NDEQ says.<\/p>\n<p><strong>UPDATE<\/strong>: Here is a map of the proposed pipeline created by NPR:<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1532\"  class=\"wp-caption module image center\" style=\"max-width: 536px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"A map of the existing and proposed Keystone XL pipelines\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/Keystone-Map.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1532\" title=\"Keystone Map\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/Keystone-Map.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"536\" height=\"578\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/Keystone-Map.jpg 536w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/Keystone-Map-300x323.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/Keystone-Map-220x237.jpg 220w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 536px) 100vw, 536px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Map by NPR<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">A map of the existing and proposed Keystone XL pipelines<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Canadian company behind the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would bring crude from the country&#8217;s oil sands to refineries in Texas, got a little gift to end out the year from the Nebraska government this week: a map of where not to put the pipeline. The pipeline ran into a snag earlier this year [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":3875,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[59],"tags":[73,21],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3870"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3870"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3870\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3889,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3870\/revisions\/3889"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}