Lots of claims flying back and forth these days over the proposed Keystone XL pipeline -- this one might qualify as the most overwrought, even from a liberal, though more such hyperbole is sure to follow.
It comes by way of self-proclaimed "Earth Doctor" Reese Halter, a conservation biologist, author and frequent Huffington Post contributor who, according to his website, has a doctorate in "subalpine eucalyptus eco-stress physiology."
Halter appeared on Ed Schultz's daily podcast this past Friday, after the Senate voted in favor of Keystone a day earlier, to warn of dire consequences if the 1,179-mile pipeline gets built. If any children are within earshot when you play the audio of his remarks, please cover their ears lest they suffer recurring nightmares.
Before introducing Halter, Schultz played a clip of former US Senator Mary Landrieu touting the project (audio) --
LANDRIEU: It relates to the Keystone pipeline and the decision that you are going to make and the administration's going to make about a critical, in my view, piece of infrastructure that will transport, safely, the cleanest barrel of oil produced in North America, contrary to popular belief.
SCHULTZ: Contrary to popular belief -- that's how thick it got during the last campaign. That was Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana who was defeated in November. (No, she lost a runoff in December). Let me tell you something, folks -- for the Republicans to say that this was a jobs bill (psst, Ed -- Landrieu was a Democrat), that it's about energy security and good trade relations with our neighbor in Canada (a subject near and dear to Schultz), that's how it was framed by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Republican from Alaska. (Suddenly Schultz remembers party affiliation). This is for all the wrong reasons when it comes to the environment.
It didn't take long for Halter to hit the panic button, much in the manner of global-warming bedwetters who've predicted imminent doom for the last quarter century. He warned of nothing less than planetary peril if the tar sands oil that Keystone would convey are extracted (audio) --
SCHULTZ: Now that it's passed, of course, there's eminent domain issues, property rights issues in Nebraska which is going to go on for several years ...
.... thereby undermining Schultz's previous claim that eminent domain for Keystone would be comparable to King George III arbitrarily seizing property during the colonial era. Not much legal recourse back then, hence, the Revolution ...
SCHULTZ: ... but what is this oil? Re-educate our audience (yes -- "re-educate") on exactly how dangerous tar sands oil is.
HALTER: Well, first of all, Ed, my mentor and colleague James Hansen, he's been in the game, in the science game, for over four and a half decades. Jim laid the cards on the table beautifully two and a half years ago in an op-ed in the New York Times (headlined "Game Over for the Climate") and he's done the math. You know, here's the thing about science (chuckles) -- science is all about math. It is precise. We don't mince things, we don't say it's kinda, sorta. When a scientist goes through the rigors of publishing his work, it is uber-clean.
Should we burn half -- half -- of that oil, that gooey, sticky, toxic oil from Alberta, we will have succeeded in end game. That's E-E (d-oh!), that's end, E-N-D game, because there's going to be so much greenhouse gas in our biosphere, in the environment, that no forest on our planet will be able to live. Not only will no forest be able to live, because it's so hot, the oceans will be completely shut down. You've heard me say this before and I'll say it again -- if the oceans die, Ed, we die.
Hansen, not incidentally, said while testifying before Congress last March that his "end game" claims have been widely "misinterpreted."
Halter all but claims across-the-board unanimity among scientists on the allegedly catastrophic environmental impact from tar sands in Canada. This is hardly the case.
Canadian climate scientist David Keith told Nature.com's Jeff Tollefson in August 2013, while Keith was teaching at Harvard, that "extreme statements" such as Hansen's claim of "game over" are "clearly not intellectually true." Ken Caldeira, a climate researcher at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Stanford, Calif., was quoted in the same article as saying he doubted there would be "any detectable climate effect" if Keystone is built.
Andrew Weaver, a climate scientist at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, calculated the impact to global temperatures if Canada's tar sands were fully developed. "The proven reserves -- those that could be developed with known technologies -- make up roughly 11 percent of the global total for oil, and Weaver's model suggested that full development would boost the average global temperature by just 0.03 degrees Celsius," (emphasis added) Tollefson wrote.
Or as Halter would put it ... run for your lives!
Did I mention that Weaver is a member of the Green Party in his province's parliament? Even among greens, there's plenty of gray, regardless of how you do the math.
