Res: The US should approve the Keystone XL pipeline.

Since I am taking Pro in this debate, I am merely arguing against the notion that the US should not approve this. Since Con has taken the BOP, I will establish a case of my own as to why there is a viable reason to approve this pipeline. Since Con did also not specify whether or not they should not pass the pipe line as of this debate, or whether they should not pass it in the future. I will also argue for the possibility that this pipeline has to improve and show why there is a viable reason to pass it when they work out some of the issues with it. I will break now break this into points. (1) Jobs and how this will effect the economy.While some sources would show this would only create hundreds possibly of thousands of jobs within the US. There have also been recent studies to show how this will affect jobs indirectly as well. Let me define what I mean by this. Directly is jobs that would be generated and kept permanently. Indirectly is jobs that would be affected by the pipeline as an outside source. This includes restaurants, hotels, markets anything near the places this pipeline would be created. Experts have shown through recent studies that an estimated 120,000-150,000 jobs would be created indirectly from this, also the possible thousand or so that would be constant. Needless to say that our unemployment rate at the moment is horrible. Anything that can generate or produce this many jobs, and even over some stimulation to the economy is an option worth considering. My adversary in his opening comment says that this will drive up gas prices effecting the overall production of food and other goods. Where as this could be as subjective and dependent on studies, I would argue the exact opposite. He also says that the oil will not stay in the US but be exported. This point is mute in a way, because that is impossible to stop from happening no matter where we get our oil. Some of the oil moving through the Keystone XL will likely be exported, but that"s no reason to stop it. U.S. oil exports are not new. American refineries are now exporting about 2.3 million barrels of refined products per day. Why do you think this is? U.S. refiners are among the best in the world. They are importing lots of lower-grade crude oil and turning it into diesel and other fuels that the world demands.The pipeline will help America"s balance of trade. Refining is manufacturing. The U.S. is importing unfinished goods (in the form of Canadian crude), finishing them, and exporting them. No matter who may read this or what some people may think, this is a good thing. My opponent may say why. 5. U.S. oil demand may be relatively flat, but it"s not going away. Opponents of the pipeline such as my adversary claim that there"s no need to build the Keystone XL, because U.S. oil demand is sluggish. That"s true, but the U.S. will continue to need lots of oil for decades to come. Here"s the latest prediction from EIA: "U.S. consumption of liquid fuels, including both fossil fuels and biofuels, rises from about 18.8 million barrels per day in 2009 to 21.9 million barrels per day in 2035." I would also like to state regardless of what my opponent may say oil is here to stay. U.S. oil consumption as a percentage of its total primary energy consumption now stands at about 37 percent. That"s the exact same percentage as in 1949. Given the amount of money that has been spent over the past six decades on reducing our dependence on oil, the hard fact is that petroleum is a miraculous substance. Nothing else comes close to oil when it comes to energy density, ease of handling, flexibility, convenience, cost, or scale.(2) Through future efforts and control over the rate at which the sands and tar are contained, we can limit damage to the environment and decrease the rate of global warmingThe State Department released its report recently on the environmental impact of constructing the controversial Keystone XL pipeline. It found that the massive pipeline is "unlikely to have a substantial impact on the rate of development in the oil sands," meaning that Canada will most likely proceed with developing the Alberta tar sands whether the pipeline is built or not, and it ultimately won't contribute to global warming. Some people can argue the immediate impact this may have, which I would agree with but remember I am arguing the possibility this may have in the future. I'm now going to break this down using some math for my opponent and whomever may be ready this. I will try to keep it simple and avoid using actually complicated numbers, so as not to confused anyone who may not know what I am referring too.Step 1: Make an assumption of how much oil that you believe Keystone XL will facilitate being burned that wouldn't be burned otherwise. You can make that number as high as you like, but give a reason or think why you may be choosing that specific number. Make the number (x)Step 2: Break down that number and calculate the expecting rise in Global temperature from it.Step 3: Finally, calculate the length of time it would take to burn the amount of oil you chose in your first step. How much would the global temperature be expected to have changed 50 years from now in your scenario? (I am going to work on the equation with a random number I picked down below so this will help you see the impact and allow you to follow along with me either using my number or a number of your choice).So lets assume the pipeline itself would transport 830,000 barrels per day (bpd) at maximum volume. I would certainly expect this volume to displace some other oil from the market such that the entire 830,000 bpd is not a net addition to the global oil market. However, the climate impact of even the total 830,000 bpd is trivial. It less than 1/10,000th of a "C per year.* This contribution to (x+current) wouldn"t even be measurable. It would merely be noise in the global temperature measurement.So next lets take the worst case scenario(at least to me, I am not sure what my adversary or you would consider the worst). What if the pipeline was the catalyst for extracting the entire Athabasca oil sands reserve in Alberta. The reserve itself contains 170 Billion Barrels, yes my opponent heard me right, 170 BILLION. Since this part is impossible for me to calucate myself I had to put it into a temperature calculator and got 0.09"C, which was really high and I dont want to think my adverary that I am spouting nonsense so then I pulled up sources to compare my results from other people who tried the same thing. Researchers who did this themselves with far far more chemical and biological experience than myself calculated that burning the proven reserve would lead to a global temperature increase of 0.02"C to 0.05"C. That is between 1/50th and 1/20th of a degree Celsius. This would not even make a dent in the climate change. Also the main part to this is that the time it takes to burn through the reserve would be erroneous. To be honest it is pointless and makes no logical sense to even compare the entire reserve to the keystone pipeline, because we are literally saying the entire reserve. Since my adversary may bring it up I cite the time it takes to burn it anyway. Experts show that at the current production rate of 1.8 million bpd of oil sands production it would take 259 years to burn through the reserve, and 2,740 years to burn through the resource. I am out of space so i will end with this. Since it is impossible to pull all the reserve at one time the 0.05 number that is the worst case scenario that I have shown before is impossible(even in spite of the fact it would not make a dent in global warming)In closing I have shown you scientific data and raised economical questions to show you that the keystone pipeline is a viable idea. Vote pro(out of space)http://climate.uvic.ca...http://www.skepticalscience.com...