Pipeline will cause damage, destruction

To the editor:

The letter by John Stiegelmeyer ('Pipeline is safer way to transport oil,” Nov. 24) hailing the benefits of the Keystone XL pipeline is a good example of how ignorance, denial and a lack of concern for the integrity of the life-support systems of the planet is likely to result in profound risks to the lives and livelihoods of humans on earth as a result of climate change, which was emphasized in a recently released report commissioned by the World Bank.

The pipeline would carry almost a million barrels a day of volatile raw bitumen from tar sands strip mines and drill sites in Canada. It will cross eight states on its way to Texas refineries. This is not conventional oil. This is tar sands crude, the world's dirtiest oil, which will release massive quantities of global warming pollution. Strip-mining a single barrel of tar sands oil results in the destruction of four tons of boreal forest, home to North America's greatest migratory bird nesting grounds. TransCanada pipelines have ruptured numerous times in the past.

The greed and lack of environmental conscience of those in the oil industry who profit from such damage and destruction knows no bounds.

The Keystone XL pipeline is an ecological nightmare: The Koch brothers get richer, the boreal forest is ravaged, America takes the risks, China gets the oil, climate change worsens, and eventually all of us get screwed. But hey, who cares?

Floyd Sandford

Cedar Rapids