The public comment period for the Keystone XL pipeline opened on Wednesday. This video is the comment from California-based climate group Movement Generation.
[youtube=http://youtu.be/g4YUVmYBYlA]Published on Feb 5, 2014
When Keystone XL’s top job recruiter comes to town, he reveals just what jobs the controversial oil pipeline would really create.
Oil executives like to claim that the Keystone XL pipeline would create thousands of jobs. But in a project fueling so many environmental and health risks, only one man is honest enough to say exactly what those jobs would be. (Hint: they’re not construction.)
It’s true, Keystone XL has a job for you! But the question is: do you really want it?
The ongoing saga over the Keystone XL pipeline turned another corner on February 5, when the State Department began its 30-day public comment period on the project.
The film is satire; as far as we know, TransCanada isn’t recruiting unsuspecting job-seekers at career fairs.
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The pipeline would transport about 800,000 barrels of fuel a day from Alberta, Canada, to the gulf coast of Texas. The type of petroleum that the pipeline would transport—diluted bitumen—releases 14 to 20 percent more climate-altering gases than traditional crude oil when burned, according to the Congressional Research Service.
The nonprofit organization Movement Generation, based in Richmond, Calif., filed its comment by way of the video above. The video pokes fun at the notion that the pipeline will create many new high-paying jobs—one of prime selling points used by TransCanada, the company responsible for its construction.
Mateo Nube, a member of the Movement Generation collective, wrote to YES! in an email about the intentions behind the clip. The group wanted to “cut through the rhetoric,” Nube said, and dismantle “the false division between a strong economy and a clean environment.”
Nube also said he hoped the video would draw attention to the Our Power Campaign, a national effort to kick start local economies and create jobs that help rein in climate change instead of making it worse.
The clip is satire; as far as we know, TransCanada isn’t recruiting unsuspecting job seekers at career fairs. However, the statistics it features on employment are drawn from a detailed report from Cornell University’s Global Labor Institute.
Read more:
- Meet the Texas Farmer Challenging the Keystone Pipeline from the Courtroom to the Plains
- Timeline of the Climate Movement: How Direct Action Took Center Stage
- Why the Climate Movement Should Have No “Keystone”