State Dept's Keystone XL Review Will Face EPA Scrutiny a Third Time

One of the biggest unknowns in the unfolding Keystone XL debate is the role the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency might play.

Because the Canada-to-Nebraska oil pipeline crosses an international border, the State Department, not the EPA, will decide whether to give the project the federal permit it needs. But the EPA can weigh in during the review, and its opinion will carry new weight now that the Obama administration has vowed to make climate change a national priority.

The EPA's position will become clearer when the State Department releases its Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) for the project, which it is expected to do any day now. The EPA did not respond to a question asking whether it plans to comment on the SEIS, but the agency has not been shy about criticizing earlier drafts.

"The EPA actually could assert a fair amount of power depending on, basically, how much they want to stick their necks out," said Jim Murphy, senior counsel at the National Wildlife Federation, which opposes the pipeline. "The level of scrutiny this is going to get is pretty intense. With each iteration this goes through, the number of eyes increases."

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