Harrop’s Keystone XL piece is hogwash

Re ``Energy beggars no more, we can be choosy,’’ by Froma Harrop, Wednesday:

This is hogwash. She quotes “moving 830,000 barrels of oil a day would be no small concern.” She writes of impending disasters like the Deepwater spill in the Gulf as a result of building the Keystone.

I guess she has never heard of the Big/Little Inch pipeline built in 1943 to transport oil and gas from Texas to Illinois, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania. It is 1,475 miles long, one of the longest in the world and passes under 33 rivers including the great Mississippi, 200 creeks, 289 railroads, 625 highways and across and under mountains.

Some say it won WW II because it saved ships and lives being lost transporting oil and gas to the industrial north. She and most folks have never heard of this major oil and gas line because there have been no major spills or accidents.

She tries to tell us just because the Keystone is not built that all the heavy oil will remain in Canada. Hogwash again. It will be transported by rail, barge to the coast and transported by oil tankers that burn oil so heavy that it has to be heated. It is so dirty that in lieu of expelling the exhaust via the smokestacks, it is expelled under water to hide the polluted exhaust.

On top of all of this, China cannot match the U.S. in refining heavy oils and not pollute the air.

The writer lives in North Myrtle Beach.

This story was originally published November 16, 2015 at 10:01 AM with the headline "Harrop’s Keystone XL piece is hogwash."