Montana Women For

Joan Kresich will be offering a training in Restorative Circles at the Bozeman Public Library on Sat Jan 21 and Sun Jan 22. There is no fee. See the flyer below for more details.

Signs of the growing desperation of the proponents of the Keystone XL pipeline:

• They released a series of threats aimed at the US.  “This week, some of the highest-ranking executives in the Canadian oil patch publicly detailed potential alternatives to Keystone XL amid a sharpening rhetoric that included a blunt caution: For some, an unfavourable decision will effectively close off the U.S. to future crude export growth, shutting down an option that has long underpinned Canada’s oil sands expansion plans.” (from the Toronto Globe and Mail, Friday Nov. 4, 2011).  You notice they are threatening to cut off export growth, not cut off the supply to current recipients of their dirty oil in the Midwest and Southeast US.  But they are trying to make it sound like they won’t sell us oil any longer, which is baloney, because there is NOWHERE ELSE FOR THEM TO SELL IT. The tar sands are landlocked and have no access to the world market UNLESS they manage to get the Keystone XL pipeline built to the Texas Gulf Coast.  The officials pulled out the dreaded China card – threatening to sell their oil to China if the US doesn’t let them build the pipeline.  But China does not currently have any refineries that could handle the bitumen (which several refineries in the US have already been converted for) and the only way to get the dirty oil to China would be to build another pipeline – one that is already being planned by a different pipeline company (Enbridge) to go through British Columbia to the west coast where supertankers would have to load the raw bitumen and travel through treacherous, fragile marine channels to take it to China.  So far, there is huge resistance to the new pipeline from British Columbia, especially from the indigenous people whose land would be crossed.  So that option is a long way off.  Now another player, Kinder Morgan Canada is soliciting bids for an expansion of their TransMountain pipeline to handle tar sands bitumen and get it to Asian markets.  Make no mistake.  This will not be a quick and easy battle.  But they would not be pouting about taking their oil and going to play with someone else if they did not fear that the growing opposition in the U.S. to the Keystone XL pipeline might yet prevail.
• The proponents have gotten their pet congressmen to sound off about jobs again, citing the same tired lies about tens of thousands of jobs that will be created.  Repeating lies over and over does not make them true.  The numbers they are citing are based loosely on a report by the Perryman Group which uses a model which it claims is proprietary so it won’t share its methodology.  At least two experts who do not oppose the pipeline, nevertheless have looked at the Perryman report and concluded that it is “dead wrong” or “meaningless.”  To put it more bluntly, the tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of jobs promised are a blatant lie and the Perryman report is a bunch of propaganda and boosterism masquerading as economic science.  The steel has already been purchased for the pipeline from Indian and Canadian sources, so the promise of manufacturing jobs is bunk.  The workers to build the pipeline are mostly already hired by TransCanada – in Canada.  The estimates by TransCanada itself, and by the State Department Environmental Impact Statement, (which turns out to have been written by a consultant hired by TransCanada) are of something less than 2000 temporary jobs lasting a matter of months each.  But the congressmen and unions who have been bought by TransCanada and their allies all keep parroting the lies from the Perryman report.  Repeating the same claims that have already been exposed as lies is a sure sign of desperation.

Meanwhile, Margie, Joanie, Tantoo, and Francis are going to join thousands of people from all over the country in forming a human circle around the White House to keep the pressure on President Obama.  When we went to the White House the first time and were arrested on the sidewalk in front of the gates, no one we knew had heard of the pipeline, and there was a strong assumption that it was a done deal.  The pipeline promoters had developed insider influence in the State Department, and had a smug assumption that the permit would sail through by now, or by the end of the year at the very latest.  But thanks to Bill McKibben and the tireless organizing of the Tar Sands Action folks, that has all changed.

President Obama made a statement that he would make the decision himself (the first time his office has said anything other than that it is the State Department’s job) and floated what seemed like trial balloons about the health of the American people and the integrity of the water sources in Nebraska.  It would be worth all opponents of the pipeline calling the White House again and encouraging him to understand that it is not just Nebraska, but Montana, South Dakota, Okalahoma, Texas and the rest of the world that stand to lose from this pipeline.  He must hear opposition from other places than Nebraska – especially places like Montana whose governor sees dollar signs in anything connected to fossil fuels and has a short enough memory to forget the disaster of the Yellowstone River spill this past spring.  As long as the word is that Montana politicians and Montanans support the pipeline, we run the risk of a plan B being approved that merely skirts Nebraska (whose citizens are united against it).

So once again, let’s all support the MWF team who are traveling to Washington DC at their own expense to fight the pipeline.  Please call the White House (202-456-1111) TODAY.

If you have been following the news on the various Occupy movements around the country, you have probably seen the footage of police crackdowns on peaceful protesters in many places.  Probably the harshest recent crackdown was in Oakland, California where tear gas canisters, bean bag rounds, rubber bullets, and flash-bang grenades were fired into crowds in an effort to clear out the Occupy Oakland encampment.  An Iraq veteran marine named Scott Olsen was critically wounded by a police projectile that hit him in the head, fracturing his skull.  He is still in the hospital, unable to speak.

The General Assembly of Occupy Oakland has passed a resolution calling for a General Strike to shut down Oakland in protest of police brutality, corporate oppression and economic injustice.  They are asking all people in Oakland to, instead of going to work or to school, instead come to Oscar Grant Plaza and join the Occupy group.  They are demanding that financial institutions close that day, or they will march there and close them down.  They are planning to march to the Port of Oakland and shut it down.

They are asking everyone in Oakland to Occupy Everywhere.  Perhaps those who support the Occupy movement or even just support free speech and the right to assemble and protest, and those who are appalled by police violence against unarmed, peaceful protesters but who do NOT live in Oakland, should take it upon themselves to spread the General Strike.  Stay away from work or school that day and gather together to Occupy Everywhere.  If the 99% are to show their economic impact, a successful general strike would be a powerful way to do it.

This is a video that MoveOn.org is promoting as an explanation of why they support occupy Wall Street.  Our support for the movement extends beyond the hope of reform of financial systems, but we really loved the clear explanations of the problem of unregulated banking that is included in this video, so we hope our readers will watch it.

MoveOn.org\’s favorite #occupywallstreet video

It is high time.   High time that the people rose up and spoke out against corporate control of our government, of our media, of our education and of our lives.  High time that young people, whose futures are being robbed, take the lead in speaking out, acting up, and  building the movement we have all been waiting for.  High time that we in the United States, who have the democracy that thousands of people have been dying for across the world in the last few years, defend that precious democracy against those who are corrupting it beyond recognition.  And, of course, high time that Montana Women For, as an organization, publicly states our support for the #occupy movements that we have been individually cheering on for over a month now.

We believe that this is what democracy looks like.  We believe in listening to the dreams and ideas of the young people whose imagination should shape the world they will live in.  We believe that the elders who stand behind them, lending support, lending their experience and wisdom, cheering them on, also must be honored and listened to. We believe that the workers who stand with them should be respected and encouraged. We believe that the occupy movement is the outpouring of frustration and anger at the deliberate manipulation of our culture to serve the ends of the mega-corporate sub-culture and the devaluing and disrespecting of the majority of people in this country.  We see this movement as a sign of bright and shining hope for our country.

There are many possible outcomes from this movement.  We see it as a positive sign that they have not settled for specific demands that could be negotiated away or met in order to dismiss the movement and go back to business as usual.  We hope that restoring common sense regulation of banking and finance, somehow overturning the implications of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision, bringing fairness to the tax structure, ending corporate subsidies, re-building and strengthening unions, and easing the burden of debt from homeowners, students, and others will be policy results.  But more importantly, we hope that this movement will cause a shift in American culture away from the idea that whatever is good for business – any business under any conditions – is what is best for all of America.  We dream of an America that values the lives of its citizens, that builds and nourishes communities and families and individuals, that cares for all its children and offers them all hope and opportunity, that respects the natural world that we live in and are part of and depend on.  And we believe that the occupy movement is a step in the direction of realizing that dream.

The free market must be a fair market.  Businesses must have the creation and delivery of quality goods and services as their goal instead of maximization of profit.  The system of money and finance must serve people and not vice-versa.  The government must once again be reminded that they work for us, and their mission is to govern wisely and well, not to raise funds for their party, and not to sacrifice us all in their quest to hang onto power.  Working people must have a voice in their workplace and protection against exploitation.

We thank the brave men and women who have stood up to brutality, disrespect, bad weather, and harassment to demand a new future for us all.

The Application for a Presidential Permit for building the Keystone XL Pipeline, a Canadian pipeline to carry tar sands oil from Northern Alberta to the Gulf Coast of Texas is under review by the State Department.  Montana Women For opposes the pipeline.  TransCanada, the Canadian pipeline company that is proposing to build the pipeline has invested huge sums of money into television ads that claim that the pipeline would create 13,000 constructions jobs or 20,000 high-wage construction and manufacturing jobs.

A few hours of research into these claims shows them to be lies.  Here is the result of that research:

Construction Jobs:

• Pipeline supporters claim 13,000 to 20,000 “high-wage construction and manufacturing jobs”

• TransCanada’s 2008 report, submitted with the application for permit describes a peak workforce of 3,500 to 4,200 .

• The same report projects only 10% - 15% of jobs will be construction jobs for Americans. (350 – 620 jobs at any one time)

• During the construction of the first Keystone Pipeline, only 11% of the workforce was locally hired. (Hearing of the Public Utility Commission of South Dakota Docket #HP09-001, 2009)

• State Department 2011 Environmental Impact Statement projects a workforce of 5,000 to 6,000.

• The EIS projects that if suitable personnel are available locally, 50 – 100 workers might be hired per spread. There are 17 spreads in the project (three in Montana). There would also be 20-30 additional jobs building pumping stations and 30-40 jobs building a Tank Farm on the Gulf Coast. This adds up to 920 – 1770 jobs for Americans. NOT 13,000 – 20,000

• The duration of these jobs is not specified, but each “spread” or section of pipeline is supposed to be completed in less than a year. So it is likely that the jobs will last less than a year.

• During the construction of the first Keystone Pipeline, of the few jobs that went to Americans, the largest number went to laborers. Only 3 of 395 welders and pipefitters were hired locally. Only 32 of 273 truck drivers. Only 20 of 301 supervisors.

Manufacturing jobs

• We don’t know where they will buy their steel or manufacture the parts for the pipeline, but for the first Keystone Pipeline, almost half the steel came from a company in India (Welspun Power and Steel). We know that because the steel was defective, and caused an investigation into the safety of the pipeline. (reported in St. Louis Post Dispatch December 10, 2010)

• We know that the Tar Sands Extraction project uses parts and equipment shipped in from Asia via Lewiston, Idaho. (see multiple reports on the Megaloads controversy)

• There is absolutley no guarantee of American manufacturing jobs.

Indirect jobs

• Pipeline supporters quote the number 118,000 related jobs during the construction of the project

• This comes from a study done by The Perryman Group which uses a model for projecting economic impact. The study projects “118,936 person-years” of employment resulting from the projected expenditures of the construction teams.

• That does not translate into 118,936 new jobs. For instance some 22,000 jobs in Retail Trades are supposed to be supported by the expenditures. But most of the stores that will be selling the workers their smokes and Twinkies will use the employees they already have. If the projected expenditures occur, there will be increased profits for retail business owners, which is a good thing, but it does not necessarily translate into increased jobs. It is hard to believe that a peak workforce of even 5,000 temporary workers will create 22,000 new retail jobs, even temporarily. .

• The larges number of person-years of employment in that 118,000 is 28,700 jobs in new construction resulting from the influx of workers. But both the EIS and TransCanada’s report mentioned that workers are unlikely to bring their families because of the temporary and mobile nature of the work. There will be work camps for the workers to stay in at some more rural locations. In larger cities, they will be housed in motels and perhaps some apartments. Even if the spending of the crews makes the local citizens flush with money and able to buy new houses, considering the glut of vacant real estate existing already, is is unlikely that there will be a rush of new construction resulting from these temporary construction crews.

• Virtually every category of jobs listed in the 118,936 employees figure is overstated. The model is flawed.

• The Perryman Group’s report clearly intends to paint a rosy picture of economic growth. This is advertising, not credible prodiction of what will actually happen..

Permanent jobs:

• Transcanada’s report: 20 employees will be required to operate the pipeline. That is for the whole country.

• EIS: “Unemployment rates in the proposed Project area would probably not be affected in the long-term,”

Job Losses:

• Increased cost of oil results in fewer jobs. A report from TransCanada, and unearthed by the National Wildlife Federation says that the pipeline to the Gulf Coast would raise gas prices in 15 Midwestern states by as much as 7 cents per gallon. This is because right now the Midwest is “oversupplied” by Tar Sands oil which is keeping the price lower there. By having the ability to ship it to the Gulf Coast instead, suppliers could sell it on the international market, forcing prices up. (Associated Press story, reported in Grand Rapids Press, January 25, 2011)

• Leaks and spills from the pipeline will impact jobs in tourism, fishing, and real estate.

Conclusion:

• TransCanada is intentionally misleading the American public about the number and type of jobs that will be created. We should not trust a company that lies to us.

• This is another episode in the long saga of boom and bust economics that have ravaged Western states like Montana throughout history. The boom will not be what they promise, and after the local section of the pipeline is built, the jobs that did exist will end and we will be left with nothing but a dangerous pipeline.

• It is not in the National Interest of the United States to provide jobs for Canadian workers (or Asian ones). The jobs for Americans in this project are too few and too temporary to significantly affect our economy.

Sources:

Application for Presidential Permit, Transcanada Keystone Pipeline, LP, 2008 available on the State Department website

Minutes of the Hearing of the Public Utility Commission of South Dakota Docket #HP09-001, 2009 available online

Final Environmental Impact Statement For the KEYSTONE XL PROJECT Applicant for Presidential Permit: TransCanada Keystone Pipeline, LP, August 26, 2011 Available on the State Department Website

The Impact of Developing the Keystone XL Pipeline Project on Business Activity in the US: An Analysis including State-by-State Construction Effects and an Assessment of the Potential Benefits of a more Stabe Source of Domestic Supply, a report prepared by The Perryman Group, June 2010 available online

The Keystone XL Pipeline Section 52 Application report for TransCanada, Section 3.4.4 available online at http://iatp.org/files/451_2_106233.pdf describes how TransCanada plans use the Keystone XL Pipeline to manipulate the oil market in the United States to increase prices in Midwestern states.

Four MWF board members traveled to Washington, DC to take part in a protest in front of the White House in an attempt to persuade President Obama to turn down TransCanada’s application for a permit to build a Canadian pipeline from the Alberta tar sands to the Texas Gulf Coast. The women from MWF were arrested, along with 1250 others during the two week protest.

Three days after the MWF members were arrested, the State Department released an Environmental Impact Statement that claimed that the damage to the environment from the pipeline would be minimal. Now the State Department is conducting a series of hearings in the states that the pipeline will go through to determine if the pipeline is in the National Interest of the United States. MWF members and others will be traveling to Glendive, Montana for the only Montana hearing in the State Department list.

In their application and subsequent reports, the only argument TransCanada gave for the pipeline being in the National Interest was “Energy Security,” claiming that the US needs the Canadian oil because it is a safe, stable, onshore source of oil to meet what they described in 2008 as “increasing demand” for oil in the US.

After doing some research into the claims on “Energy Security,” we have found that they are not true. The following is the result of that research:

In its 2008 application for a Presidential Permit, TransCanada stated that the pipeline would be in the National Interest of the United States because it would strengthen Energy Security.

TransCanada’s arguments (as stated in their permit application) were

• The pipeline would increase the supply of oil from the Alberta Tar Sands to the US
• There is an increasing crude oil demand in the US
• The domestic crude supply in the US is decreasing
• The pipeline would be an opportunity to reduce US dependence on OFFSHORE foreign oil supply (the Canadian oil would, of course, be foreign oil, but would not have to cross the seas to get here) through further supply diversification to “stable, secure Canadian crude supplies”
• There is a demonstrated interest in the project from shippers (producers, marketers or refiners). The application states that “Shippers have already committed to binding contracts totalling 300,000 bpd in support of the Project.”

A study published this month (September 2011) by Oil Change International (a group that works toward a transition from an oil economy to a sustainable economy based on renewable energy) investigated these claims and found them to be false. The US crude oil market has changed dramatically since 2008. Their arguments are that:

• The Keystone XL pipeline is an export pipeline. There are already two pipelines taking crude tar sands oil to the midwest for refining and consumption in the US. The Keystone XLpipeline is designed to take the oil to the Gulf Coast where it will have access to shipping for export to Europe and Latin America. This will not affect the “energy security” of the United States, and will not lower gasoline prices as the pipeline’s boosters imply.
• Valero, the top beneficiary of the Keystone XL pipeline, has recently explicitly detailed an export strategy to its investers. Valero has locked in at least 20 percent of the pipeline’s capacity and, because the refinery in Port Arthur is within a Foreign Trade Zone, the company will accomplish its export strategy tax free.
• US demand for gasoline is no longer increasing, and in fact, is now decreasing because of higher fuel economy standards and slow economic growth. This was not true in 2008 when Transcanada made their permit application.
• US production of crude oil is increasing for the first time in 40 years because of a surge of oil production from oil shales in North Dakota and Texas.
• With the pipelines already in place bringing Canadian crude oil to the midwest and the new shale oil production, there is a glut of oil in the US. The US is now a net exporter of oil and refined oil products.
• There is a shortage of diesel capacity in global refining because of high demand in Europe and developing countries. And There is a long term shortage of refining capacity in Latin America. As a result, gulf coast refiners have been increasing exports of diesel to Europe and Latin America.
• –The tar sands oil (called “heavy sour” oil) requires special refining techniques. Refitting the refineries to process heavy sour into diesel for export means it will no longer be profitable for them to process the “light sweet” oil coming from the domestic oil shales in Texas and North Dakota. So the Canadian (foreign) oil is actually undercutting our ability to process domestic oil. And it is being done for export, not primarily for consumption in the US.
• The refineries of the three biggest shippers who have committed to use the Keystone XL pipeline are all located in a Foreign Trade Zone, meaning that they will not need to pay customs duties on importing the oil from Canada, nor will they need to pay export duties on the oil they ship overseas. They are also exempt from certain local and state taxes. This amounts to a sizeable subsidy to the oil industry to export refined oil products.

Meanwhile, a related argument from the oil boosters is that increasing oil supply from Canada will lower gas prices.   But two different reports – one from TransCanada  and the other created for the US Department of Energy (DOE) by a company called EnSys – both state clearly that the price of oil would INCREASE by $3 per barrel in 15 Midwestern United States . A business professor from the University of Calgary who specializes in oil markets stated that that increase in crude oil prices, which is admitted by TransCanada, would translate to approximately 7 cents per gallon increase for gasoline in those states. The oil price increase is because the new Keystone XL pipeline would allow the oil producers in Canada (not TransCanada, whose business is building pipelines) to manipulate the market by only supplying enough oil to the midwestern refineries to keep the prices up there, while still being able to sell their oil at top dollar for the import market on the Gulf Coast. Both reports described the current condition as a surplus supply of tar sands oil available to the Midwest refineries, which allows the American refineries to buy it cheaply. Ironically, two of the states where gas prices would increase are South Dakota and Nebraska, which would have the pipeline going through their lands. The re-fitting of refineries in the US to handle the Canadian tar sands oil would allow Canadian oil companies to manipulate the US oil market to their advantage. This is NOT energy security. The professor from University of Calgary states that “The United States needs to protect itself against the flexing of marketing muscle by those who control the Canadian tar sands supply.” The TransCanada report states that “The resultant increase in the price of heavy crude is estimated to provide an increase in annual revenue to the Canadian producing industry in 2013 of US $2 billion to US $3.9
billion.”

Furthermore, the EnSys report for the DOE found that the best route to lowering dependence on Mideast oil is reduced consumption through strong policy actions such as the fuel consumption limits announced by President Obama earlier this year. That combined with some increase of Canadian oil to the refineries for domestic use in the Midwest “could essentially eliminate Middle East crude imports longer term.” The Keystone XL pipeline would not affect that scenario unless producers used it to starve the midwestern refineries of Canadian crude, in which case it would INCREASE the dependence on offshore imported oil.

The following sources were used in the argument above:

TransCanada’s Application for a Presidential permit, available online at the State Department website: http://www.keystonepipeline-xl.state.gov/clientsite/keystonexl.nsf/presidentialpermitapplication.pdf?OpenFileResource

Exporting Energy Security: Keystone XL Exposed, an Oil Change International Briefing, September 2011, available online at: http://www.policyinnovations.org/ideas/policy_library/data/01614/_res/id=sa_File1/OCIKeystoneXLExport-Fin.pdf

The Keystone XL Pipeline Section 52 Application report for TransCanada, which was produced for Canadian government officials, has been moved from its former location on the web. However, it can now be found at http://iatp.org/files/451_2_106233.pdf The section on price increases in the US market is section 3.4.3. In one of the Appendices, on page 24 of the online report, TransCanada shows a graph that demonstrates that the pipeline will NOT decrease the import of crude oil from the Middle East and Venezuela.

The EnSys study for the DOE can be found on the web at http://www.keystonepipeline-xl.state.gov/clientsite/keystonexl.nsf/AssmtDrftAccpt.pdf?OpenFileResource

Interview with Philip Verleger, a business professor at the University of Calgary and Louis Fenyvesi of TransCanada’s Calgary headquarters in the Lincoln Journal Star can be found online at http://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/article_7c6a08e6-0fbe-5ee4-89ef-a599b315a3f9.html