All About the Keystone XL Pipeline

If you pay attention to the news, you have probably heard about the Keystone XL Pipeline. It was a big issue in 2014 and it has now continued into 2015. If you have not heard about it, it is a 2,000 mile pipeline that flows oil produced by tar sands in Canada and it runs all the way to Texas. Many people are for it because of the 120,000 jobs and increases the about of oil we produce domestically so oil will be cheaper. If you're an advent reader of my blog, you know I am interested in anything to help the environment, and so I wanted to see why environmentalists were fighting the Keystone XL Pipeline. An article by the Labor Network for Sustainability really had some great points.  It said that "To produce one barrel of heavy crude oil from tar sands requires strip mining the forest, extracting four tons of earth, contaminating two to four barrels of fresh water, burning large amounts of natural gas, and creating vast holding ponds of toxic sludge." Now I see why Republicans are mainly for the Keystone is because they do not care about the environment. This project is taking down trees and destroying habitats for animals. And what happens if there is an oil spill? There will be oil over 2000 miles of land! I know people need jobs, but is it worth the risk? I do not think so. People are putting jobs over our beautiful environment. Another point the article talks about are the rising greenhouse gas emissions and this project will increase them even more due to the deforestation and burning of coal.





Last week there were big news about the Keystone XL pipeline. In the article "Obama Facing Rising Pressure on Keystone Oil Pipeline" from the New York Times discussed how the House passed a bill approve the Keystone in Nebraska. The final vote was 266 to 153. The representatives who supported it said that the pipeline will bring 830,000 barrels of oil per day to the Gulf Coast, creates jobs and adds 3.4 billion to the economy, is domestic, and it does not increase greenhouse gases as much as environmentalists said it does. Another claim they have is that it will not destroy much of the environment. The Nebraska governor approved it after the pipeline company, TransCanada, changed its route to avoid the Sandhills region. Even with all these great pros I still doubt their sources and I hope the President vetoes it. We need to protect the environment and the Keystone Pipeline will destroy it. We should be moving away from oil, not try to get more of it. It would be best to invest in renewable energy, and I hope President Obama thinks the same way.

Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles

In my other articles I have discussed electric cars and gasoline-powered cars, but have you ever heard of a hydrogen fuel cell car? Using hydrogen as a power source is not  really a new technology-NASA has been using it for 50 years-but now Toyota is now using that fuel for cars. Hydrogen fuel cars work like this: 

I think it is so fascinating how we could just use water to power a car. It has no emissions so it is amazing for the environment. I think it is kind of weird for water to leak on the streets. I know this will be way ahead in the future, but what if everyone gets a hydrogen car, then there will be a lack of water, and cause corrosion of the streets and our sewers will get full. I read a really cool article from the magazine Bloomburg BusinessWeek called "The World's Biggest Car Company Wants to Get Rid of Gasoline." That title really got my attention, so I was excited to read it. It discussed Toyota's huge move to create the first mass-produced hydrogen car called the Toyota Mirai.

It has a driving range of 300 miles and emits only heat and water. It is on the market in Japan, but does not go on the market in the U.S. until the end of this year with a price tag of $62,000. It does not go pretty fast. The problem with hydrogen fuel cell cars-sometimes the same problem as electrics-are the lack of fueling/charge stations. There only 8,849 electric stations and 21,916 charging outlets in the U.S. And since hydrogen fuel is so new we only have 20 stations in the whole U.S., mostly in California. There are a lot of other car companies like Tesla who really question the reliability and benefits to the environment hydrogen fuel cars have. I feel like scientists should gather more evidence to settle this dispute. Another problem the article discusses is that even though they have gotten the price of hydrogen lower, making it cheaper than gasoline and electricity, hydrogen can be a very dangerous fuel. It is highly explosive which is very scary to me. Imagine if there is a gas leak on the road, there is a chance the car could explode! Toyota said they handled most of those issues, but I am still not 100% about trusting them. For me this car is so new, and nothing has come out like it, and so I do not know how it is actually going to be. Hydrogen is not easily made into fuel, and we do release emissions while changing it into a fuel. We need to reduce our emissions, global warming is upon us, and I really admire Toyota for being different and trying to help the environment, but we will just have to wait and see how successful these cars are in the long-run.


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