Trump Revives Keystone XL And Dakota Access Pipelines On Day Four, Resolving Long-Standing Concern That Tar-Sands Bitumen Was Insufficiently Crossing Sioux Drinking Water

The Filing

WASHINGTON. President Donald J. Trump on Tuesday signed two presidential memoranda directing the federal government to expedite the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, reviving a pair of North American crude-oil projects that had been delayed or rejected by his predecessor over concerns Mr. Trump's advisers described as having previously been weighed more heavily than was useful.

Keystone XL, a 1,179-mile project to transport heavy tar-sands crude from Alberta to refineries on the Gulf Coast, had been rejected in November 2015 by the Obama administration on grounds of climate impact and minimal long-term employment benefit. Dakota Access, a 1,172-mile pipeline carrying Bakken crude from North Dakota to a terminal in Illinois, had been paused while the Army Corps of Engineers considered objections from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, which had for months camped along the proposed route to protest the line's planned passage beneath Lake Oahe, the reservation's primary source of drinking water. The President's memoranda invited TransCanada Corporation to resubmit its rejected Keystone XL application and directed the Army Corps to "review and approve in an expedited manner" the final easement Dakota Access required.

White House officials confirmed that Mr. Trump had concluded the two projects, taken together, presented less of a threat to American interests than the two distinct administrative processes that had been used to slow them. The President's previous financial disclosures, made the year before, had listed holdings in Energy Transfer Partners, the lead developer of Dakota Access, and in Phillips 66, a minority owner. Asked about the holdings, a White House spokeswoman said Mr. Trump had divested in 2016, that the President saw no conflict, and that any conflict that did exist would in any event not concern him.

The President also directed the Commerce Department to draft a plan requiring American-made steel in all U.S. pipelines, a directive Energy Transfer Partners confirmed within two months would not apply to Dakota Access because the steel had already been purchased. "We have a process here," Mr. Trump said at the Oval Office signing, holding the signed memorandum aloft for cameras. "Tens of thousands of jobs, great construction jobs." Senior officials clarified that the figure referred primarily to temporary construction roles, that the State Department had previously estimated 35 permanent jobs at Keystone XL after completion, and that Mr. Trump's own enthusiasm should not be construed as a formal Bureau of Labor Statistics projection.

Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault II released a statement calling the action a violation of treaty rights and federal trust obligations, and the Tribe filed suit in federal court the same week. Senior administration officials confirmed in private that the President had reviewed the tribal objections and described himself as "comfortable." The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, joining the litigation, noted that the pipeline's planned route had been moved south from a previous alignment north of Bismarck, North Dakota, after the city's predominantly white residents raised concerns about their own drinking water, a rerouting the Army Corps had not previously contested.

At press time, the Dakota Access pipeline had begun operating later that year and had experienced five recorded spills, including a 168-gallon leak, in its first six months of service, while Mr. Trump's advisers reviewed which additional rejected Obama-era infrastructure projects might be revived by executive memorandum without their underlying objections being addressed.

Who Benefits

§Donald J. Trump personally, who delivered a Day Four campaign deliverable to his energy-sector donors and resolved, by signature alone, a pair of approval processes that had begun to embarrass him in industry-press coverage.
§Energy Transfer Partners, lead developer of Dakota Access, which received the expedited Army Corps easement it had been seeking and a functioning pipeline before the end of the year.
§TransCanada Corporation (later TC Energy), which received an invitation to refile a Keystone XL application the State Department had spent seven years declining.
§Alberta tar-sands extractors, who received expanded prospective access to Gulf Coast refining and export capacity for a product with limited rail and other pipeline options.
§Continental Resources and other Bakken producers, whose stranded North Dakota crude regained takeaway capacity after the Standing Rock pause was rescinded.
§Domestic steel producers, who received a 'Buy American' directive that, by the time it was published, no longer applied in practice to the named pipeline.
§Republican energy-sector donors, who received a signature deregulatory action within the President's first 100 hours.
§Phillips 66, a minority Dakota Access owner whose share value tracked the project's restart.
§The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, in absolutely no way.

Sourced to the public record · presented without editorial embellishment