Pipelines Are Essential To Job Creation; Energy Security
Hidden below the surface lies an underground maze of infrastructure providing our state with the resources that sustain our modern day life: pipelines.
Like nourishing blood pumping through a body, pipelines are the crisscrossing veins and arteries transporting and delivering vital energy resources throughout Texas and our nation. Texas pipelines keep our state and our economy moving. Delivering energy products – including natural gas, crude oil and refined products – pipelines support our economy and provide Texans with critical resources.
Since the advent of the use of pipelines in the mid-1850's, pipelines have become the safest and most cost-effective manner of transporting our nation's energy resources. Can you imagine a safe system of transport relying solely on wooden barrels or tanker trucks?
Pipeline safety is key to maintaining the state's energy economy. The Texas Railroad Commission monitors, executes, and enforces state and federal rules and regulations governing pipeline safety. The state has gone so far as to impose stricter pipeline safety regulations than the federal government and was the first to require the testing of intrastate high-pressure transmission lines.
Pipeline operators are invested in the integrity of their pipes to keep the lines in operation. Operators attempt to balance the needs of the land surrounding the pipe and the various materials coursing through the pipe by building modern day pipelines with superior materials and anti-corrosive methods that help maintain the viability of the line, as well as implementing computer technology and controls that ensure the pipe is safe for the surrounding environment and communities.
That is one reason why the opposition to the state of the art TransCanada Keystone XL Pipeline is confounding. Proper analysis, public input and environmental studies have already been considered during the pipeline's approval process. Delays and obstacles, and the ultimate rejection of the permit, by the federal government are further evidence of the unnecessary overreach by the Obama administration and federal inaction that will kill jobs. It is particularly confusing considering the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness stated in its year-end report 'We should allow more access to oil, natural gas and coal opportunities on federal lands.' The President is rejecting good science and smart economics to appease the liberal agenda and Americans are paying the price.
With the Obama administration's job-crippling mindset, Texas and the nation may not see this new pipeline project come to fruition for some time. Sadly, the Keystone XL Pipeline will not soon join the state's existing network of over 350,000 miles of pipe infrastructure that efficiently deliver volumes of essential energy products to major cities and towns throughout Texas and the nation who are depending on the availability of these goods to be sold and used every day.
The Keystone Pipeline would have not only provided a boost to local economies and grow Texas jobs, but it would also enhance our nation's energy security with less dependence on oil from unstable countries and fanatical regimes and an increase in North American energy production.
By saying yes to safe pipeline projects, we are protecting our nation's energy independence and helping provide direct and indirect American jobs. This valuable infrastructure that feeds precious energy resources throughout Texas and our nation must not be taken for granted and must continue to be developed. We must stand up for American jobs by fighting for good and sound policy decisions that encourage pipeline project development in order to help the U.S. economy grow and allow Texas to remain the fastest growing economy in the nation.
