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Keystone Pipeline Killed: Is The Fight Really Over?

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President Obama says no to the Keystone pipeline. We'll look at the fight and the future of Canada's tar sands.

The Keystone Steele City pumping station, into which the planned Keystone XL pipeline was to connect to, is seen in Steele City, Neb., Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2015. On Friday, Nov. 6, President Barack Obama announced he's rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline because he does not believe it serves the national interest. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik)
The Keystone Steele City pumping station, into which the planned Keystone XL pipeline was to connect to, is seen in Steele City, Neb., Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2015. On Friday, Nov. 6, President Barack Obama announced he's rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline because he does not believe it serves the national interest. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik)

After seven years of review, Barack Obama said no to the Keystone pipeline on Friday. What’s been called “the dirtiest oil in the world” will not flow anytime soon via Keystone XL from the tar sands of Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. It was an epic fight, groaning with politics and symbolism, and playing out while the world of oil and energy and climate change has changed, for better and for worse. This hour On Point, we talk with Bill McKibben, who led the fight against Keystone. With a South Dakota U.S. Senator who says it’s not over. We go to Canada and more, on climate and the Keystone pipeline.
-- Tom Ashbrook

Guests

Campbell Clark, chief political writer for the Globe and Mail. (@camrclark)

Coral Davenport,, energy and environment reporter for the New York Times. (@CoralMDavenport)

Bill McKibben,  environmentalist, author, co-founder of 350.org, an environmental group working to help solve the climate crisis. (@billmckibben)

Sen. Mike Rounds, (R-SD), Republican U.S. Senator from South Dakota. (@SenatorRounds)

From Tom's Reading List

New York Times: Obama rejects construction of Keystone XL oil pipeline — "The once-obscure Keystone project became a political symbol amid broader clashes over energy, climate change and the economy. The rejection of a single oil infrastructure project will have little impact on efforts to reduce greenhouse gas pollution, but the pipeline plan gained an outsize profile after environmental activists spent four years marching and rallying against it in front of the White House and across the country."

NPR News: What The Keystone XL Pipeline Decision Actually Means — "This is the first time that a world leader has stopped a major fossil fuel project because of its effect on the climate. It's the first time that the power of big oil's been broken like that even a little, and that's a pretty astonishing thing."

The Wall Street Journal: The Tombstone Pipeline -- "A President more invested in the real economy would have long ago welcomed Keystone’s contribution to North American energy development. But on Friday Mr. Obama emerged, seven years into both his Presidency and multiple State Department reviews of the pipeline, to declare that Keystone is not in the national interest of the United States."

This program aired on November 9, 2015.

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