TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Canadian energy infrastructure operator TransCanada will file an application with the Nebraska Public Service Commission (PSC) to seek approval for the Keystone XL route through the state.

TSX- and NYSE-listed TransCanada on Wednesday changed tack, saying it would drop its current ‘eminent domain’ actions to force land-holders to provide it access to land and was taking steps to terminate constitutional court proceedings in Holt County, Nebraska.

"After careful review, we believe that going through the PSC process is the clearest path to achieving route certainty for the Keystone XL project in Nebraska. It ultimately saves time, reduces conflict with those who oppose the project and sets clear rules for approval of the route,” TransCanada president and CEO Russ Girling stated.

The nearly 2 000 km pipeline would connect to TransCanada’s existing Keystone network that delivered crude oil to the US Midwest and Gulf Coast, providing a more direct route to the Gulf by cutting diagonally from the Saskatchewan/Montana border to Steele City, in Nebraska. The pipeline would deliver 830 000 bbl/d to refineries on the Gulf Coast.

CONTESTED ROUTE
The current proposed route for the $8-billion Keystone XL pipeline had been evaluated by the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality and approved in 2013 by Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman.

In January 2012, President Barack Obama had rejected the application amid protests about the pipeline's impact on Nebraska's environmentally sensitive Sand Hills region. On April 18, 2014, the Obama administration announced that the review of the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline had been extended indefinitely, pending the result of a legal challenge to a Nebraska pipeline siting law that could change the route. On January 9, the Nebraska Supreme Court cleared the way for construction and on the same day the House voted in favour of the pipeline.

However, Obama again vetoed the Keystone XL pipeline in February and returned the project for congressional action. The Senate held a vote in March that failed to override President Obama’s veto of the Bill. The State Department review was ongoing.

The contested route was the preferred route of the majority of Nebraskans who participated in a thorough comment period that included open house discussions and allowed for hundreds of supplementary comments, the company said.

The review also included conversations with landowners along the pipeline corridor, 91% of whom had now signed voluntary easements on their properties to construct Keystone XL.

The project had undergone five independent reviews of safety and potential environmental impacts by the US State Department as well as one authored by the state of Nebraska after its year-long public process. All reviews concluded that the project could be constructed and operated safely with minimal impact on the environment.

Despite having route authority to construct Keystone XL, uncertainty in the courts around the constitutionality of how the route was approved was very likely to carry on once again to the Nebraska Supreme Court.

"Our goal is to achieve route certainty in Nebraska in a timely manner. We have concluded that seeking route approval from the PSC gives us the best opportunity to build a pipeline the majority of Americans and Nebraskans support,” Girling added.