Keystone XL Pipeline, final environmental impact statement is consistent with IHS previous research

On January 31 2014 the US State Department released the Final Supplemental Environment Impact Statement for the Keystone XL Project. The Final EIS found that oil sands production is expected to continue at similar levels regardless of whether the Keystone XL goes forward is consistent with previous research findings by IHS.

IHS expects oil sands production to grow from 1.9 million barrels per day (mbd) in 2013 to 4.3 mbd in 2030 and does not expect the Keystone XL decision to have a material impact on the production outlook.

A recent IHS Oil Sands Dialogue study found that Keystone XL would have no material impact on US greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The report, Keystone XL Pipeline: No Material Impact on US GHG Emissions and all other Oil Sands Dialogue research are available at: www.ihs.com/oilsandsdialogue The study observed that 3 million barrels per day (mbd) of additional oil sands pipeline capacity (not including Keystone XL) is currently proposed. Eighty percent of this proposed alternate capacity travels exclusively through Canada-connecting the oil sands with Canada's west and east coasts-and thus would not require US government approval.

Even if pipeline capacity were to lag behind oil sands growth, the study said that transportation by rail is expected to play an ongoing role and that greater investment could make rail more economic to a level approaching that of pipelines.

The study found that with sufficient scale and investment the additional cost of transporting oil sands by rail to the US Gulf Coast rather than by pipeline could be lowered from today. If heavy oil sands producers were to invest in improved rail efficiencies, the economics could be within $6 per barrel compared to pipeline (for each barrel of oil sands produced). This would place rail well within the break even range for most oil sands production. One source of improved economics could come from shipping oil sands bitumen in its pure state. A lack of pipeline capacity would incentivize such added investment, the study said.

This article was published by S&P Global Commodity Insights and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.