A few weeks back, Ross Hammond from Friends of the Earth, wrote a diary about the various ways in which the State Department's analysis of the Keystone XL pipeline may have been influenced by Big Oil and its friends. Now we at Oil Change International are working with Friends of the Earth, the Sierra Club, and others to fight back and demand an investigation.
You know what they say about crap in crap out? Well that may just be the case for the State Department's report. There are so many problems with it, it's hard to imagine anyone but the oil industry itself having written it...and unfortunately it appears that's not very far off.
Here's what we sent to our supporters today:
Dear friends,
A few weeks ago you joined citizens around the country to submit over one million comments to the State Department pointing out the problems with their report analyzing the Keystone XL pipeline. The number of problems identified was so numerous that you’d think the oil industry itself had written State’s report for them.
Well, unfortunately it appears that may not be all that far from the truth…and it’s time to raise some noise about it.
It turns out that the firm - Environmental Resources Management (ERM) - hired by the State Department to write this flawed review is a dues-paying member of Big Oil’s mouthpiece in Washington, the American Petroleum Institute. And if that weren’t enough, many of the sub-contractors hired by that firm have deep ties to the oil industry as well.
And that’s just the beginning. Will you join us in telling Secretary Kerry we won’t stand for this?
Two years ago, we helped uncover similar corruption in the State Department’s last review of the pipeline. The Keystone XL pipeline has been a flawed project from the start, and the decision to approve or deny the pipeline shouldn’t be based upon a flawed process. That’s why we’re demanding that the Office of Inspector General of the State Department initiate an investigation, and we hope you’ll join us.
We'll be working with partners to deliver your signatures on this demand directly to the State Department in less than a week. Add your voice today.
Thanks,
Steve
I've
reported previously on how much money the oil industry and other fossil fuel interests have contributed to the campaign coffers of our members of Congress who vote to support the Keystone XL and other fossil fuel interests.
But it's become clear that Big Oil's grip on Washington doesn't end on Capitol Hill...it extends to Foggy Bottom as well.
The decision to reject Keystone XL is a no brainer to begin with...But with the oil industry trying to stack the deck by peddling its influence in Washington, that clear decision becomes a little harder to see. It's up to us to expose these realities and demand a clear-headed, fact-based decision based on the merits and not on who has more money to throw around. In the context of facts, rejecting Keystone XL is simply the only choice to make.