WASHINGTON -- Arkansas' U.S. Sens. Mark Pryor and John Boozman rejected one senator's attempt to connect the Keystone XL Pipeline to the 2013 Mayflower oil spill Tuesday. The two men supported the bill, which failed to pass Tuesday evening.
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Tuesday evening the Senate voted 59-41 in favor of SB2280, which authorizes TransCanada Keystone Pipeline LP to construct, connect, operate and maintain the pipeline over objections and concerns from President Barack Obama and several environmental groups.
As part of the agreement with Senate Democratic leaders to bring up the bill, it needed 60 votes to pass.
The U.S. State Department has spent six years reviewing permits for the project, which would transport heavy crude from Alberta to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. The department has jurisdiction because the pipeline crosses an international border.
Obama has said that the review of the permits and an ongoing lawsuit over the project in Nebraska should be completed before a decision is made on the pipeline.
Pryor and Boozman have supported the project for years, and Pryor was among the 11 Democrats who co-sponsored the bill. The entire Arkansas House delegation voted in favor of the bill Friday.
Boozman said that if the bill is not approved this year, he expects it to come up again when Republicans control both the House and Senate starting in January.
The Senate spent the bulk of its day debating the pipeline.
Standing beside a large poster that stated "misery follows the tar sands," U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., referred to a 2010 pipeline rupture in Kalamazoo, Mich., and the 2013 rupture in Mayflower during debate about the bill on the Senate floor. Boxer is chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
"We know, as sure as I'm standing here, if this is built, there will be a spill because that happens, and it has already happened in 2010 and in 2013," she said as an aide placed a large photo of oil in a Mayflower cul-de-sac on the tripod next to her.
On March 29, 2013, Exxon Mobil's Pegasus pipeline ruptured in the Northwoods neighborhood of Mayflower. Authorities ordered 22 homes evacuated there, and many residents never moved back. The Pegasus pipeline includes a 13.5-mile section that runs through the Lake Maumelle watershed, which provides drinking water for about 400,000 central Arkansans.
"You know, you might want to talk to the people in ... Mayflower, Arkansas. Do you know Exxon had to buy back the homes because they couldn't be lived in anymore because this stuff spilled and contaminated an entire neighborhood?" she said. "I call this the X.L., the extra lethal pipeline. The pipeline itself is benign. It's what's going through it and what it will release [that is lethal]."
After she spoke, Boozman told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette it isn't fair to compare the more than 6-decade-old Exxon pipeline that ruptured in Mayflower with the "state-of-the-art" Keystone XL Pipeline.
"I think she is comparing apples to oranges," he said of Boxer.
"This technology is very safe, it has an excellent track record," Boozman said. "There's thousands of miles of pipeline throughout the country, and it's just an efficient means of transporting oil."
Boozman, a Republican from Rogers, said the environmental objections are more about whether to use oil than about whether to build a pipeline.
"The people who don't want this, don't want this period. They simply don't want to use fossil fuels," he said.
Pryor said the crude oil will be extracted whether the pipeline is built or not. The pipeline would be safer than moving the oil by train, boat or truck, he said.
"All of those things could have an accident," he said. "With pipelines there will be spills, but it's the safest and cheapest way to transport fuel, or in this case crude oil. It's the safest and cheapest way to do it. If you're going to use it, you're going to have to transport it somehow."
The Little Rock Democrat, who lost to Republican Tom Cotton on Nov. 4, pointed to the miles of pipelines that crisscross Arkansas.
"Even though it was a terrible hardship for those people in Mayflower ... I still think a pipeline is the safest way to transport things," Pryor said. "Obviously, you've got to build it to the right standards, you've got to test it and maintain it, and do all that you have to do."
The Keystone XL Pipeline would not pass through Arkansas, but hundreds of miles of pipe for the project were created at the Welspun Tubular LLC facility on Frazier Pike in Little Rock. About 350 miles remain in storage there, Welspun USA President David Delie said by phone Tuesday.
A section on 11/19/2014