NRDC blasts TransCanada over proposed pipeline

The Natural Resources Defense Council is pushing back against claims by TransCanada that it is misrepresenting the risks associated with a controversial proposed pipeline project.

“We will put up our credibility up against TransCanada any day of the week. You can believe the EPA and one of America’s premier environmental advocacy groups or you can believe a greedy Big Polluter with a history of leaks from their pipelines,” NRDC spokesman Josh Mogerman said in a statement to The Hill.

{mosads}Mogerman’s comments underscore the growing tensions in the environmental community surrounding TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry oil sands from Alberta to refineries in Texas.

The State Department is heading up a multi-agency review of the project and the administration is expected to complete the review by the end of the year. Groups like NRDC have mounted a sweeping opposition campaign to the project, while Republicans and the oil industry have rallied around the proposal, arguing it will create thousands of jobs and help wean the country off of its dependence on Middle Eastern oil.

Following two recent leaks at one of TransCanada’s existing oil pipelines, the company insisted this week that its proposed pipeline is safe.

And TransCanada specifically accused NRDC and the Environmental Protection Agency of distorting facts in an effort to scuttle the project.

“We are just trying to get the facts out,” Keystone Pipeline Vice President Robert Jones said Wednesday on a conference call with reporters. “When there is a misrepresentation in an EPA letter or in a press release from the Natural Resources Defense Council, we want to correct that.”

NRDC’s Mogerman said the environmental group’s objections to the pipeline are based on solid facts.

“Look at the facts, figures and science that we quote in our reports which are culled from academia and the oil industry’s own documents,” Mogerman said. “TransCanada would like to point at the messengers because the message about their product is pretty tough to argue with.”

{mosads}NRDC has raised concerns about the potential for spills along the Keystone XL pipeline, pointing to a series of recent leaks on TransCanada’s existing Keystone pipeline, which runs from Alberta to Oklahoma.

There have been 14 leaks on the Keystone pipeline since it started operating in the spring of 2010. Two leaks in May caused federal pipeline regulators to issue a corrective action order requiring TransCanada to ensure that the line can operate safely. One day later, regulators agreed to allow TransCanada to restart the pipeline.

TransCanada has said that the leaks were small and were detected quickly.  The company told reporters this week that it is making changes to the design of the proposed project to ensure that such incidents don’t occur again.

NRDC’s comments come after the Environmental Protection Agency raised concerns about Keystone XL. The agency recently blasted an updated State Department environmental review of Keystone XL as “insufficient,” raising concerns about the effect of potential spills on groundwater and greenhouse gas emissions resulting from oil sands production.