New developments in Keystone XL pipeline
Posted Apr 18, 2012 9:25 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A couple of developments on the Keystone XL pipeline Wednesday evening.
TransCanada says it has submitted a proposal for a new route through the U.S. midwestern state of Nebraska for the disputed pipeline.
The new route will go around the sensitive sandhills area of the state.
Details of the new route were not immediately available. A spokeswoman for the State Department said officials had not received notification of a new route.
U.S. President Barack Obama blocked the pipeline earlier, citing uncertainty over a planned route intended to avoid Nebraska’s environmentally sensitive Sandhills region.
State Department approval is needed because the $7 billion pipeline crosses a U.S. border.
The other development happened in Washington where legislation that would allow the pipeline to proceed has been passed by the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Keystone XL pipeline project was included as part of a larger bill passed by the house that finances road projects through stopgap measures.
But the White House has vowed to veto the legislation because it mandates the construction of the Alberta-to-Texas oil pipeline that Obama earlier blocked.
