Keystone XL: The Real Price of a Pipeline

Although Warner (D) ended up voting in favor of the bill, on Tuesday November 18, the US Senate rejected TransCanada’s Keystone XL Pipeline proposal by one vote.

As “What You Need To KnowAbout The Keystone XL,” an NPR story by Jeff Brady and Scott Horsely mentions, XL is “just a fraction” of the existing pipeline. This would have been the fourth part of the Keystone Pipeline Project spanning from Alberta, Canada to Steele City, Nebraska (the first three parts have already been approved, built and are currently used to transport US oil). This article looks at some pluses and minuses to Keystone XL, but there are several other articles- cited at the end- that provided me with information to come to the conclusion that our country is not ready for Keystone XL.

For many Keystone looked like a good thing for the country. It was predicted that this fourth phase- the XL Pipeline- would eventually transport 830,000 barrels of oil per day. That means less of a reliance on the Middle East, and more American energy independence. But if this is all you know about the project than I challenge you to look beyond the TransCanada fact sheet.

The XL Pipeline would transport Canadian tar sands- acknowledged as one of the dirtiest hydrocarbons in the market. Its production requires clear cutting of forests to steam the grounds and extract the oil. It is estimated that the tar sands production creates 17 times the amount of greenhouse gases as US production of conventional oil (Brady), and 2-5 barrels of fresh water for every barrel of bitumen (heavy crude oil). Then we need to find space to create artificial “ponds” for the tailings- the toxic water leftovers. At this point you may be thinking ok, “well this is Canada’s problem right? We don’t have to deal with the consequences.”

Not quite. Our US pipeline regulations have standards made for the transport of light crude. Diluted bitumen is the mixture of a lighter hydrocarbon, chemicals (frequently including benzene a known carcinogen), a bitumen- heaviest crude oil today. Although the studies’ results are mixed, the fact that some studies have proven the transport of “dilbit” to result in increased temperatures, pressures and corrosiveness of the pipelines indicates to me that more research needs to be done (Song).

studies done by  the Natural Resources Defense Council and others

Also the results of  a “dilbit” spill can be much more damaging than that of a conventional spill, because unlike a conventional spill where the oil floats on the surface of the water, in a dilbit spill, the lighter hydrocarbons evaporate and the heavier bitumen sinks into the riverbed. These spills are harder and much more expensive to clean up (Song).

We have seen this play out before. In 2010, around the time of the BP Oil Spill, Enbridge Energy Partners’s pipeline broke in Kalamazoo, Michigan creating The Marshall Spill. It is estimated that while it costs $2,000/ barrel to clean up a conventional spill, it cost $29,000/ barrel to clean up the Marshall “dilbit” spill. Four years and $1 billion later, they are still cleaning up the mess (Song).

Another problem is our inadequate response mechanisms. Industry relies on remote sensors to indicate the presence of a leak. The sensor takes eight minutes to alert the control center of what has happened. However, the fatal flaw is that this alarm detects changes in all oil flow and pressure, and therefore it goes off not only for leaks but also for bubbles in the oil. As we saw in the Kalamazoo incident, it is not easy to decipher between the two. Sixteen alarms went off, but the controllers assumed the problem was oil bubbles and continued the flow of oil. It wasn’t until 17 hours after its start, that the leak was confirmed (Song).

And these are the spills that are caught. According to a Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration study between 2002-2012, the device only caught 5% of the nation’s spills.

This is more than an environmental problem. In the case of Kalamazoo, the Michigan Department of Community Health study estimated that 58% of the residents living in vicinity experienced adverse health effect).

It’s easy to say that Enbridge Energy Partners are not the same as TransCanada, and therefore we should not be punishing TransCanada for their mistakes.  This would be easy if TransCanada had a clean record, but unfortunately they don’t. Between June 2010 and September 2011, the first phase of the pipeline had already leaked 14 times. Twelve of these were so big that they had to be brought to federal authorities (Song).

Although the bill did not pass Tuesday, it is likely to come around again next congress with a republican senate. Obama is still waiting for a verdict from the Nebraska court as to the exact route of the pipeline, but once the verdict is out, there is a good chance Obama will approve it. And even if he doesn’t, there is the likely possibility of a Senate override.

I am concerned that we are entering a new game without changing the old rules. We don’t have enough data, regulations or response mechanisms to give the go ahead to Keystone XL. This project should only pass when we are 100% certain that public safety will not be compromised. We are not there yet.

Works Cited

“Acute Health Effects of the Enbridge Oil Spill.” Michigan Department of Community Health MDCH, Nov. 2010. Web. 17 Nov. 2014. <http://www.michigan.gov/documents/mdch/enbridge_oil_spill_epi_report_with_cover_11_22_10_339101_7.pdf>.

Brady, Jeff and Horsley, Scott. “What You Need To Know About The Keystone XL.” NPR NPR, 17 Nov. 2014. Web. 21 Nov. 2014. <http://www.npr.org/2014/11/17/364727163/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-keystone-xl-oil-pipeline>.

Casey-Lefkowitz, Shope and Swift. “Tar Sands Pipelines Safety Risks.” NRDC, NWF, Pipeline Safety Trust and Sierra Club. Feb 2011. Web. Nov. 2014. <http://www.nrdc.org/energy/files/tarsandssafetyrisks.pdf>.

Song, Lisa. “A Dilbit Primer: How Its Different from Conventional Oil.” Inside Climate

News Inside Climate News, 26 June 2012. Web. 16 Nov. 2014. <http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20120626/dilbit-primer-diluted-bitumen-conventional-oil-tar-sands-Alberta-Kalamazoo-Keystone-XL-Enbridge >.

Song, Lisa. “Few Oil Pipeline Spills Detected by Much-Touted Sensors.”

            InsideClimateNews InsideClimateNews, 19 Sept. 2012. Web <http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-19/oil-pipeline-spills-go-undetected-by-much-touted-sensors.html>.

Thanksgiving: The Real Moveable Feast

http://www.igourmet.com/images/topics/turkey1.jpg

In just a few days, you will be chowing down some delicious pumpkin pie and cranberry sauce. But do you really know the story of Thanksgiving? Here is some food for thought.

According to James Baker’s novel, Thanksgiving: The Biography of an American Holiday, the spring after their arrival in Plymouth, Mass., the English settlers met Squanto of the Wampanoag tribe. Squanto, who after having been kidnapped by an English sea captain, sold into slavery and then miraculously escaping back to the U.S., knew how to speak English and acted as a translator and guide for the colonists. He taught them how to grow crops such as corn. In autumn 1621, the settlers and the Wampanoag tribe gathered for a three-day long feast with food contributed by both sides: the wildfowl from the English and five deer from the natives. But this wasn’t a spontaneous event. Both the English and Native Americans had ideas and practices leading up to this day.   

The English settlers dreamt of their Thanksgiving day before they set sail on the Mayflower. The Puritans celebrated spontaneous days of “thanks” and “fast” for God in England. Their deeply religious nature and love for holidays may very well have played a role in the creation of the event.

In addition, Chief Kevin Brown of the local Virginia Pamunkey tribe emphasized how the Native Americans had been practicing days of thanks long before the colonists arrive.  In fact, each season had a day of thanks determined by nature. They would give thanks in the fall when there was a harvest moon and the sweet corn was green. In the summer, it was when the strawberries were ripe.

Alas, the feast between the Wampanoag tribe and Pilgrims is the traditional story of the “First Thanksgiving.” However, over the years we have recreated our own perceptions of Thanksgiving, borrowing and emphasizing certain events from the past, as well as constructing the day to fit current values.

For example, our addition of fall décor and the great harvest feast has been elaborated immensely throughout the years, and has incorporated many parts of traditional New English dinners — including foods like pies and turkey.

Pilgrims weren’t incorporated into the holiday until the late 18^th and early 19^th centuries with the creation of Forefather’s Day to remember the pilgrim’s arrival to America on December 22, 1620. During and after the Revolutionary War, Americans glorified the past, and decided they needed a day to remember their forefathers- hence the creation of Forefather’s Day. In the late 1800s during the Victorian era, people often romanticized the pilgrims and ultimately focused on the happy ending of the feast, rather than the winter hardship of their arrival. This was projected to the public through literature and art such as Jane Austen’s Standish in Standish (1889). With technological innovations such as the printing press, novels were more accessible to the public and these ideas spread faster than they had previously. Therefore, the image of the pilgrims at the Thanksgiving feast was what was planted in the public’s mind and the holiday of Forefather’s day gradually died out.

All the way through the 19^th century, the theme of religion was central to Thanksgiving. The colonists were made up of English Puritans, and therefore the holiday was religious from the start. The first event on the day’s agenda was always a 10am church service where people could give thanks to God. Until around 1815, the fall holiday was coupled with the spring fast to ask for forgiveness from God. In September 1789, The House of Representatives authorized the first thanksgiving by proclaiming “a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God.” The irony was that this resolution was passed the same day the Congress passed the First Amendment, which stated, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion”(PBS).

Until the 1830s, Christmas was perceived as a trivial holiday and therefore people were looking for a winter religious holiday — Thanksgiving would fit the bill. After a big push from Sarah Josepha Hale (a fervent Thanksgiving advocate), Abraham Lincoln proclaimed “Thanksgiving” as a national holiday in 1863 to “to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens” (Baker, Peggy). Although presidents in the past had declared Thanksgiving a holiday, this was the first time a specific date was attached, and the first time the holiday was addressed to such a large constituency. During the Civil War both the Union and Confederacy celebrated “Thanksgiving” when they each won a battle, using the holiday to justify that God was on their side. However, once the war was over, Lincoln proclaimed the holiday to both the North and South, bringing the whole country together.

In more recent years, we have seen consumerism influence our beloved holiday.  In November 1939, FDR moved Thanksgiving up to the third Thursday in November after pressure from the National Retail Dry Goods Association for an extra week of Christmas shopping. Confused and outraged, for the next two years half of the United States chose to maintain Thanksgiving on the last Thursday, while the other half switched the celebration to the third November. In 1941, the country had enough and Congress signed legislation enacting Thanksgiving as a national holiday celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November (seen as a compromise between the two).

To this day we see the value of consumption everywhere from advertising in the Macy’s Day Parade to the increase of not one, but three football games.

Although capital is clearly present, Thanksgiving is, of course, still a holiday for family and friends to come together and show their gratitude. Today we highlight the message of two different cultures coming together peacefully. We use this message as a means of hope for a better future.

Alas, the evolution of Thanksgiving shows how with each new decade different parts of the “first Thanksgiving” are played out or added too. It is constantly changing to meet our current social values.

For this reason I would consider Thanksgiving the real Moveable Feast.

 

Delicious Pumpkin Pies from our Feast

Works Cited

“Alcatraz is not an Island,” PBS. ITVS. 2002. Web. 13 Nov. 2014. <http://www.pbs.org/itvs/alcatrazisnotanisland/activism.html>.

Baker, James W. Thanksgiving: The Biography of An American Holiday. Lebanon, NH: University of New Hampshire Press, 2009. Print.

Baker, Peggy M., “The Godmother of Thanksgiving: the story of Sarah Josepha Hale.” Pilgrim Society & Pilgrim Hall Museum. 2007. Web. 13 Nov. 2014. <http://www.pilgrimhallmuseum.org/pdf/Godmother_of_Thanksgiving.pdf>.

“Lesson Plan: George Washington and Religious Liberty.” PBS. The Claremont Institute. 2002. Web. 29 Nov. 2014. <http://www.pbs.org/georgewashington/classroom/religious_liberty3.html>.

“The First Thanksgiving: Thanksgiving Timeline.” Scholastic. Scholastic Inc. 2014. Web. 29 Nov. 2014. <http://www.scholastic.com/scholastic_thanksgiving/feast/slideshow.htm>

Native Americans- Not Just a Textbook Figure

It is around this time of year that Native Americans are brought up in conversation. You may have recently colored in the stereotypical Native American on a worksheet with a feather popping out of this head and a braid rolling down his shoulder, or you may remember acting in a Pilgrims and Indians play. But how do Native Americans really feel about Thanksgiving? What has their role been throughout history and what are their perceptions on Thanksgiving today?

In Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621, the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag Indians had a rather amiable feast where both parties brought food to the table.

However soon after the feast, there was much hostility between the native people and colonists. In 1637, Massachusetts’s soldiers killed 700 Pequot Indians in Mystic, Connecticut. In 1676, after the unsuccessful uprising of King Philip’s War, native people were killed and enslaved.

To remember these hardships, a group of Native Americans and others get together on Cole’s Hill in Plymouth, Massachusetts at noon on Thanksgiving. While one side of the town celebrates the day with a large parade, the United American Indians of New England participate in a “Day of Mourning."

On the west coast, others participate in “Un-Thanksgiving Day.” Both of these counter-holidays resulted from the slew of Native American Civil Rights protests in the 1970s. Among them were “Occupation of Alcatraz”  where the “Indians of All Tribes” occupied Alcatraz for 14 months. Others included the burial of Plymouth rock and the seizure of the the Mayflower 2 replica.

The purpose of a “Day of Mourning” and “Un-Thanksgiving Day” is to remember the losses and advocate for reform.

In his book “Thanksgiving: The Biography of An American Holiday,” James W. Baker says that although the history of the native people is “damning without exaggeration,” it should not be associated with Thanksgiving. The Thanksgiving feast was a moment in time when two different cultures could peacefully come together for a meal. The suffering of the native people should be taught, but as a separate memorial day.

Chief Kevin Brown from the local Pamunkey Tribe (an hour northwest of Williamsburg) agrees that Thanksgiving should be a joyous day.

“One thing that we haven’t held onto is hatred. Only a minority of Native Americans partake in ‘Un-Thanksgiving.’ I celebrate Thanksgiving. It is a time to get together with family and eat lots of food,” Brown said.

However, Ashley Atkins (’15) a PhD candidate in the department of anthropology and the director of the Pamunkey Indian Museum and Cultural Center (http://www.pamunkey.net/museum.html ) suggests that certain misconceptions should be changed.  

According to a Penn State study, 87% of American Indian references in schools refer to Native Americans in a pre-1900s context.

“If people do know Indians still exist they believe we are stuck in the past, and if we don't look like our ancestors did 100+ years ago then they don't consider us to be ‘real’ or ‘authentic’ Indians,” Atkins said. “But I would like people to know that none of that is true. We are still here; we live in the modern world like everyone else, but we have a deep honor and respect for our history, ancestors and continuing traditions. I want people to understand that we, as a people, are relevant beyond the American holiday of Thanksgiving.”

Professor Andrew Fisher explains how Jean O’Brien’s “firsting and lasting” theory could contribute to the American misconception that Native Americans no longer exist.

“Anglo Americans assert their rights to inherent this land by process of ‘firsting’ which says things like the ‘first settlement’ or the ‘first thanksgiving’ and lasting like the ‘last Indian chief,’ or ‘the last pow wow.’ It is all a way of discursively erasing native people from the landscape,” Prof. Fisher said.

To remind The Commonwealth of Virginia that Native Americans are still here, the Pamunkey tribe delivers a deer offering to the governor’s door around the time of Thanksgiving. 

“It is our way of saying we are keeping our side of the treaty and we hope that you keep yours,” Chief Brown said referring to the 337-year-old peace treaty between the British crown and Native American leaders to ensure certain rights such as specific tax exemptions to the native people.

The Pamunkey deer offering in the 1930s-40s

Oil-Eating Bacteria in Gulf

Today, I spoke with Northern Gulf Institute Director, John Harding, who researched the effect of the BP Oil Spill. He told me the Gulf has been able to handle the spill because of oil-eating bacteria that have naturally habited there because the Gulf floor has oil that naturally flows out of the ground. When the spill occurred this bacteria multiplied.

According to Harding, in some ways it hurt the people there more than the gulf itself because no one wanted to buy fish out of the gulf after the spill so all the fishermen had a really hard time. Because NOAA put limitations on the areas of fishing due to pollution, some areas with no fishing are now seeing some of the largest fish in ages.

I mean in no way to downsize the effect of the spill. Marine and mammal life were both greatly impacted by this preventable disaster. I just wanted to add this new insight.

To check out what these microbes actually are, you can check out this link.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/slideshow/gulf-oil-eating-microbes-slide-show/