Approval of the tar-sands carrying Keystone XL pipeline is a guaranteed path towards increased greenhouse gases, which would worsen climate change, thereby failing President Obama’s own “climate test” for the pipeline’s approval, according to a report released Tuesday from the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).
“Our analysis clearly demonstrates that the Keystone XL pipeline would dramatically boost the development of dirty tar sands oil, significantly exacerbating the problem of climate pollution,” Susan Casey-Lefkowitz, director of NRDC’s international program, said in a statement.
The pipeline would add up to 1.2 billion metric tons of carbon pollution to the atmosphere over the 50-year span of the project, according to the economic and climate analysis from the group. And, adds Casey-Lefkowitz, “this is without taking climate pollution from destruction of Boreal peatlands and wetlands into account.”
The group quotes Obama’s climate address from June when he said:
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