Not familiar with the argument, not sure if our single year of net exports of refined fuel is because of the down economy or part of a longer trend. I don't think our refining capacity has much to do with the pipeline.

be careful you don't introduce facts that won't corroborate his panacea about energy independence.

It doesn't really, sort of a tangent. I've heard the argument quite a lot in explanation of high gas prices, especially back when they were $4/gal.

I can remember this stuff too like. if they have some sort of problem at a refinery and it is off line for any amount of time gas prices spike.

? Seriously...does that stuff make sense to anyone else? How exactly can you say that canadian market manipulation will raise the cost of fuel? By them shipping more of it somewhere else?

Supply and demand are pretty important when it comes to market forces. If the oil is cheaper to move, it makes it cheaper to buy. There is literally no way that increasing supply to an area can increase price.

And the part about market rates in the midwest made perfect sense.

So we import crude from dangerous places to refine it and export it?

Does that make any sense?

If we reduced exports, maybe we could reduce dependence, and we could certainly reduce pump prices.

At any rate, it's laughable to say that drilling more oil here or building this pipeline to supply the USA with more crude will reduce fuel costs for Americans, when the crude and the refined product will be exported to the highest bidder.

Yes, it will create a a few thousand temporary jobs for its construction, but that will be negated by the higher crude, refined fuel, and food prices for Americans. Add in the environmental externality costs, and the XL Pipeline is a bad idea, unless you are an oil company, or Canadian, as higher oil price is the main reason the Canadian loon is anywhere near parity with the dollar.

While world crude prices are benchmarked and traded in financial markets at WTI and Brent benchmarks, there are always price differences in local and regional markets. This is why prices vary across the country. There has long been an ample supply of WTI crude and refining capacity in and around Cushing, Ok and the Midwest which have kept prices depressed despite the efforts of oil companies to reduce refining capacity and jack the price as high as the local and regioanal markets will bear. This XL Pipeline will remove this glut and raise price. Simple as that.

The financial and tax accounting for the vertically-integrated oil companies is even more lolable, but my lunch-time is over.

I think you have made an argument for importing oil from Canada as opposed to the middle east. An argument I agree with.

Opposition to this pipeline is basically a backwards way for a carbon tax that Obama could never get approved. Obama wants to increase fuel costs because of his AGW stance, but he can't politically just be straightforward about it, so he pulls this type of crap.

Also, random notes:

1) OP, PUBLIC POLES
2) LOL at this process. There's no reason to take this long to make a decision, one way or another.

"Republicans move to control Keystone approval"

Good luck with that.

So by "makes no sense at all" and "it's gibberish" - you really meant I agree with his main point and just think he underestimates the effect.

But anyway. Please:

1. Explain how the Midwest is going to be paying more than market rate for oil after the pipeline is built.
2. Explain why the Midwest should get a discount on gas compared to the rest of the US/Continent.
3. Explain how you believe in Supply/Demand for the Midwest - but not believe in Supply/Demand for other places?

Explain how the midwest is supposed to be all gung ho about taking on all the environmental risk while knowing their gas prices could rise from where they are now?

Midwest isn't going to be paying more for oil products because of an increase in supply.

lol nice insta delete suzzer, i'd love to see what mechanism, exactly, is going to cause a price increase because of more supply.

The refineries there (in the Midwest) won't have more supply. My understanding is that the pipeline gives them the ability to move their supply to other refining areas.

Seriously? The environmental risk from this is significantly lower than the environmental risk of states along the gulf of Mexico. So... I'm not exactly feeling that sorry for them.

Edit: Not to mention I understand why they themselves wouldn't want the project to succeed for their own self interest. I'm just not sure why its an argument that should be used to sway other people.

Koch Brothers have a large stake in the project and most of the oil refined from the pipeline will be exported out of the US.Whats not to like?

Yes they will, more crude will be brought in.

Let's put this in perspective. The 42,000 gallons spilled is equivalent to about 4.5 tanker trucks or less than a single oil container pulled by a train.

How do you know the extra supply will be enough to offset the ease of transport to places with higher demand?

This pipeline is going to be underground and much higher volume right?

And more will be shipped out.

For example:

We produce 100 gallons/year locally. We can transport 50 gallons/year out of our local area. This means we're going to be able to buy cheap oil locally since the alternative is that it sits in tanks somewhere.

If I now build a pipeline that will bring in 500 gallons/year locally but has capacity for transporting 750 gallons/year I have both more supply and higher prices.

I thought it was both - but whatever. The point still stands that Klinker's example of environmental disaster isn't very good.

How about the Alaska pipeline spills? Some of those have been pretty gnarly.

Transport costs aren't zero bro.