Conservationists file suit to block proposed Canada-to-Texas pipeline

OMAHA, Neb. -- U.S. officials illegally allowed a Canadian company to begin preparing the route for its proposed 1,700-mile-long oil pipeline from western Canada to Texas, even though the project hasn't gained final government approval, three conservationist groups contend in a lawsuit filed Wednesday.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service should not have allowed TransCanada Corp. to begin clearing a 100-mile corridor through northern Nebraska grasslands because the State Department hasn't signed off on the Keystone XL pipeline project, the groups argue in their lawsuit filed in federal court in Omaha.

TransCanada was allowed to mow down delicate native grasses and to relocate an endangered species living there, the American burying beetle, they say.

"It's our contention that that activity is illegal. They should not be constructing the pipeline, and they should not be out there," Noah Greenwald, the Center for Biological Diversity's endangered species director, said at a news conference in Omaha.

The plaintiffs, who also include the Western Nebraska Resources Council and Friends of the Earth, are seeking to stop the preparations for the proposed pipeline, which would carry an estimated 700,000 barrels of crude per day from the oil sands of Alberta, Canada, to Texas Gulf Coast refineries.

Two-sided issue

TransCanada spokesman Shawn Howard said the claims made in the lawsuit are false and that it mowed some grass as part of efforts to protect and move some of the protected beetles. In every case where mowing was done, the company received permission from landowners, Howard said.

"We respect the regulated review process currently under way and in no way would we impact that by beginning construction without a permit," Howard said in a written statement.

Howard stressed that mowing doesn't constitute construction.

Pipeline supporters, including some business groups and unions, say it would double the capacity of an existing pipeline from Canada and make the U.S. less reliant on Middle East oil. They also say it would create jobs in the states it would pass through -- Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.

In Nebraska, the pipeline has drawn opposition from an unlikely coalition of farmers, ranchers, landowners, environmental groups and other activists who fear it will leak and contaminate the Ogallala aquifer, which supplies drinking and irrigation water to eight states.

Some climatologists have also argued that by increasing production from the tar sands, the U.S. would begin an increase in the burning of carbon-intensive fossil fuels that contribute to global warming.

Earlier this week, opponents of the pipeline released emails and other internal documents that they say demonstrate an overly cozy relationship between State Department officials and TransCanada.

The groups asked President Barack Obama to intervene and block the pipeline project.