The State Department announced that it will prepare a supplemental environmental impact statement assessing the new route proposed by TransCanada for the northern section of its Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. This route avoids the environmentally sensitive Sand Hills region of Nebraska, which has been the key issue triggering the agency’s past refusal to approve the project’ previous route.
On May 4, 2012 the company submitted a new application to the State Department for the northern segment of the pipeline, after the department twice rejected the Alberta-Houston project, once in November last year and again in January, citing threats to the Sand Hills and Ogallala Aquifer in Nebraska. TransCanada split the embattled crude oil pipeline into two separate projects in February to allow the company to proceed with construction of the southern portion running from the oil hub at Cushing, Oklahoma to the Gulf Coast. This segment does not need a presidential permit from the State Department as it does not cross a US border. The new route for the northern segment runs from the Canadian border in Phillips County, Montana, to a pipeline interconnection at Steele City, Nebraska.
