Keystone Pipeline Whistleblower
“Let’s Have At It” Published 1-10-12 in the Appleton Press
by Brian Wojtalewicz
Mike Klink used to be an inspector for the giant construction corporation Bechtel. It was a major contractor on the original TransCanada Keystone Pipeline, finished in 2010. Klink cited numerous problems of shoddy materials and poor work on that pipeline, which brings tar sands crude oil from Canada to our Midwest states. Rather than fix the problems and do it right, Bechtel fired Klink.
Klink emphasizes that he is speaking as an engineer, and not as an environmentalist. (What’s wrong with being both?) He points out that since the construction, there have been over a dozen spills on that pipeline, and the main problems are at pump stations, where he cited the faulty construction. He is warning against letting TransCanada build an even longer pipeline from Alberta all the way down to the Gulf of Mexico in Texas.
Klink wasn’t surprised to hear about a terrible spill in Ludden, N.D., where a 60-foot plume of crude oil spewed tens of thousands of gallons of toxic tar sand on farm fields. TransCanada’s reaction? It claims the pipeline has been okay, and 14 spills aren’t too bad. As Klink points out, this TransCanada pipeline is leaking like a sieve and this is in the first year of operation!
The Texas oil men and the Republican Party all over the country are pressuring Obama to approve this pipeline. They’ve pounded out a false claim that it will be bring 30,000 jobs to Americans, when the jobs will be more like about 3,000. Most of the oil that reaches the gulf from this proposed new disastrous pipeline would actually leave the U.S. Most worrisome about this boondoggle project that will fatten the profits of Texas oil men is that it encourages the ongoing tar sands mining in Alberta, which promises to be the worst global warming project in our planet’s history.
Will we Americans come to our senses in time?