Did Buffett Help Obama Kill Keystone Pipeline to Reap Financial Gain?

The Blaze.com

As the nation’s gas prices skyrocket, critics argue that President Obama’s recent rejection of the $7 billion, “shovel-ready” Keystone XL oil pipeline, followed by his continued vow to “double down” on green energy, is a clear sign the administration plans to do little of substance in terms of American oil exploration. The move has also stirred controversy about the president’s real intentions concerning job creation and reducing pain at the pump for everyday Americans.


TransCanada and the Keystone XL oil pipeline

TransCanada filed an application to build the nearly 1,700-mile underground pipeline in 2008 and passed two rigorous State Department reviews. In February 2010, South Dakota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) granted a permit based on a thorough work up of the project.

“There has been a great deal of work and due diligence leading up to this decision,” said South Dakota Public Utilities Commissioner Dustin Johnson in an interview with DownStreamToday. “The record compiled in this case is pretty impressive. In the end, I feel the conditions we have placed upon this project ensure that it will be constructed in a manner that is sensitive to South Dakota and her people.”


Another Public Utilities official said he believed “the process by which this application was considered was open, thorough and fair” and Keystone openly pledged to station full-time personnel in South Dakota to respond to any emergency situations that may have arisen, according to the report.

That was apparently not enough for the White House, however, which sent TransCanada and others back to the drawing board in January 2012, citing environmental concerns.

To bypass obstacles created by special interest groups and the Environmental Protection Agency, a March 2012 amendment was introduced in the Senate that would have eliminated the need for a federal permit, while addressing environmentalists’ worries by placing more autonomy in Nebraska’s hands. After a vote, however, the measure was squashed 56 to 42.


If allowed, Keystone would have brought a reported 830,000 barrels of crude oil per day from Alberta, Canada, to U.S. outposts and refineries on the Gulf Coast and created thousands of jobs.

In the wake of Obama’s political maneuvering, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper deemed the U.S. an unreliable energy partner and is thus expanding his country’s crude export. The move will result in Canada eliminating the discount it once afforded the U.S. on its oil products.

The administration’s alleged reason for rejecting the application for the pipeline submitted by Calgary-based TransCanada was said to be based on a “recommendation” by the State Department, which concluded there was not enough time to assess alternate pipeline routes. Yet, as we have pointed out, the pipeline was under review for no less than three years and was approved earlier. In addition, if environmental concerns were truly the catalyst for rejecting the pipeline, why then would the president seem comfortable with operating pollutant-emitting freight trains along a Northern railroad line through the United States?

Warren Buffett’s Burlington Northern Railroad

What would prompt the president to turn the lights out on what critics argue would have been an environmentally-sound, job-boosting, oil-producing project that would benefit the nation and preserve the financially beneficial Canadian-U.S. oil relationship? What does President Obama have to gain by rejecting Keystone XL and who else stands to benefit from his decision?


It was previously reported on The Blaze that Warren Buffett’s Burlington Northern Santa Fe LLC railroad — a unit of Buffett’s Omaha, Nebraska based Berkshire Hathaway — would be among those poised to reap sizable gains by the administration’s decision to reject TransCanada Corp’s oil pipeline permit. According to Bloomberg, Berkshire Hathaway completed its roughly $26.4 billion purchase of Burlington Northern, issuing new stock and paying out $15.87 billion in cash.

“Whatever people bring to us, we’re ready to haul,” Krista York-Wooley, a spokeswoman for Burlington Northern told Bloomberg. If Keystone XL “doesn’t happen, we’re here to haul.”

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