Thursday, August 25, 2011

the keystone pipeline debate

Sometime before the end of this year, the State Department will decide whether to approve the 1,700-mile-long Keystone XL pipeline, intended to connect the tar sands of Alberta, Canada, with the refineries of southern Texas. For many environmentalists, the fate of the world, literally, depends on the Obama administration's yea or nay.

"The Keystone Pipeline," wrote global warming activist Bill McKibben, in a letter urging concerned citizens to join a two-week protest in front of the White House, would be "a fuse to the biggest carbon bomb on the continent, a way to make it easier and faster to trigger the final overheating of our planet ..." In an essay titled "Silence Is Deadly," NASA climatologist James Hansen declared that if the tar sands are fully exploited for their oil deposits, "it is essentially game over" for the planet.
- Salon

An extremely tough and unenviable decision for Mr. Obama. Wow.

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