Findings back Biden in axing Keystone
WASHINGTON • The U.S. government watchdog found multiple problems with the construction, manufacture and design of TC Energy Inc.’s Keystone XL pipeline, validating President Joe Biden’s decision to revoke its permit, leaders of several House Democratic committees said on Monday.
The committee leaders requested the Government Accountability Office report in November 2019 after more than 11,000 barrels of crude oil leaked from the pipeline in two releases in less than two years.
“In its thorough review of the pipeline’s history and construction, GAO found that preventable construction issues contributed to the current Keystone pipeline’s spills more frequently than the industry-wide trends,” they said in a statement.
Keystone’s four largest spills were “caused by issues related to the original design, manufacturing of the pipe, or construction of the pipeline,” the GAO report said.
Biden cancelled Keystone XL’S permit on his first day in office on Jan. 20, dealing a death blow to a long-gestating project that would have carried 830,000 barrels per day of heavy oilsands crude from Alberta to Nebraska.
“TC Energy’s record among its peers is one of the worst in terms of volume of oil spilled per mile transported,” a statement from the lawmakers said.
“President Biden was clearly right to question this operator’s ability to construct a safe and resilient pipeline, and we support his decision to put Americans’ health and environment above industry interests,” they said.
Elsewhere, Brookfield Infrastructure Partners LP won enough shareholder backing to push ahead with its $8.6-billion takeover of Inter Pipeline Ltd.
Inter Pipeline shareholders agreed to tender 65.6 per cent of the common stock not already held by Brookfield Infrastructure, the Toronto-based company said in a statement late Friday, confirming an earlier report by Bloomberg News.
It will file a mandatory extension of the offer to Sept. 3 to allow remaining shareholders time to tender, after which it will own 68.9 per cent of outstanding common shares, it said. It then intends to take Calgary-based Inter Pipeline private.
Brookfield easily exceeded the 55-per-cent support it needed from Inter Pipeline investors. Earlier, people familiar with the matter said it had passed that threshold ahead of a deadline for shareholders to tender on Friday afternoon.
The vote ends a six-month battle for control of Canada’s fourth-largest pipeline company. The tussle over Inter Pipeline has been the biggest corporate fight in the Canadian resources industry since Newmont Mining Corp. thwarted a hostile bid by Barrick Gold Corp. in 2019 by agreeing to a joint venture around the two companies’ projects in Nevada.