[16] The Keystone XL Pipeline Project (Phase IV) revised proposal in 2012 consists of a new 36-inch (910 mm) pipeline from Hardisty, Alberta, through Montana and South Dakota to Steele City, Nebraska, to "transport of up to 830,000 barrels per day (132,000 m3/d) of crude oil from the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin in Alberta, Canada, and from the Williston Basin (Bakken) region in Montana and North Dakota, primarily to refineries in the Gulf Coast area".

[52] In September 2011, Cornell ILR Global Labor Institute released the results of the GLI Keystone XL Report, which evaluated the pipeline's impact on employment, the environment, energy independence, the economy, and other critical areas.

The President said in Cushing, Oklahoma, on March 22, "Today, I'm directing my administration to cut through the red tape, break through the bureaucratic hurdles, and make this project a priority, to go ahead and get it done.

[6][16] On January 24, 2017, in his first week in office, President Donald Trump signed a presidential memorandum to revive both Keystone XL pipelines,[72][73] which "would transport more than 800,000 barrels [130,000 m3] per day of heavy crude" from Alberta to the Gulf Coast.

[70] On March 9, 2017, the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier of Alberta Rachel Notley attended North America's largest energy conference – CERAWeek in Houston, Texas.

[83][84] In June 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit granted the Justice Department's motion to lift the injunction blocking construction and found that the new permit mooted the prior Montana lawsuit.

[95] On April 15, 2020, District Judge Brian Morris issued a suspension of the pipeline construction after the plaintiffs, the Northern Plains Resource Council, alleged the project was improperly reauthorized back in 2017.

On July 6, 2020, in the US Army Corps of Engineers v. Northern Plains Resource Council case, the Supreme Court of the United States ordered all Keystone XL work be halted.

[117] In response to the article, Congressmen Henry Waxman and Bobby Rush submitted a letter to the Energy and Commerce Committee urging them to request documents from Koch Industries relating to the pipeline.

"[126] Many American and Canadian indigenous groups have opposed the Keystone XL project for various reasons,[127] including possible damage to sacred sites, pollution, and water contamination, which could lead to health risks among their communities.

[128] TransCanada's Pipeline Permit Application to the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission states project impacts that include potential physical disturbance, demolition or removal of "prehistoric or historic archaeological sites, districts, buildings, structures, objects, and locations with traditional cultural value to Native Americans and other groups".

[141] The report prompted 14 senators and congressmen to ask the State Department inspector general on October 26, 2011 "to investigate whether conflicts of interest tainted the process" for reviewing environmental impact.

[147] An investigation by the magazine Mother Jones revealed that the State Department had redacted the biographies of the study's authors to hide their previous contract work for TransCanada and other oil companies with an economic interest in the project.

[148] Based on an analysis of public documents on the State Department website, one critic asserted that "Environmental Resources Management was paid an undisclosed amount under contract to TransCanada to write the statement".

[153] In contrast, the President of the Rosebud Sioux Nation, Cyril Scott, has stated that the November 14, 2014, vote in favor of the Keystone XL pipeline in the U.S. House of Representatives is an "act of war", declaring: We are outraged at the lack of intergovernmental cooperation.

In 2011, Russ Girling, president and CEO of TransCanada, touted the positive impact of the project as "putting 20,000 US workers to work and spending $7 billion stimulating the US economy", according to a report they commissioned.

[43] In 2012, the US State Department estimated that the pipeline would create about 5,000 to 6,000 temporary jobs in the US during the two-year construction period, would increase gasoline availability to the Northeast and expand the Gulf refining industry.

[186] Bill McKibben, environmental and global warming activist and founder of 350.org, the group that organized the 2009 international protests—described by CNN as "the most widespread day of political action in the planet's history"—led the opposition to the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

[188] A broad coalition of protesters, including Phil Radford, Daryl Hannah,[189] Dave Heineman, Ben Nelson, Mike Johanns and Susie Tompkins Buell challenged him to keep that promise.

Organizer Bill McKibben said, "this has become not only the biggest environmental flash point in many, many years, but maybe the issue in recent times in the Obama administration when he's been most directly confronted by people in the street.

[44] One of the major concerns was the way in which the original route crossed the Sandhills, the large wetland ecosystem in Nebraska, and the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest reserves of fresh water in the world.

On November 22, 2011, the Nebraska unicameral legislature passed unanimously two bills with the governor's signature that enacted a compromise agreed upon with the pipeline builder to move the route and approved up to US$2 million in state funding for an environmental study.

[54][213] On September 5, 2012, TransCanada submitted an environmental report on the new route in Nebraska, which the company says is "based on extensive feedback from Nebraskans, and reflects our shared desire to minimize the disturbance of land and sensitive resources in the state".

[216][notes 2] On March 21, Mother Jones revealed that key personnel employed by Environment Resources Management (ERM), the consulting firm responsible for generating most of the SEIS, had previously performed contract work for TransCanada corporation.

[217] In April 2013, the EPA challenged the U.S. State Department report's conclusion that the pipeline would not result in greater oil sand production, noting that "while informative, [it] is not based on an updated energy-economic modeling effort".

"[230] Keystone XL was proposed to carry crude derived from Alberta's oil sands, not from underground reservoirs like conventional petroleum, but in a tarry fossil fuel called bitumen.

[233] In its March 2010 report, the NRDC stated that "the Keystone XL Pipeline undermines the U.S. commitment to a clean energy economy", instead "delivering dirty fuel at high costs".

[251][252] The House Energy and Commerce Committee's chairman at the time, Representative Henry Waxman, had also urged the State Department to block Keystone XL for greenhouse gas emission reasons.

The same poll found the pipeline favored by majorities of men (69%), women (61%), Democrats (51%), Republicans (82%), independents (64%), as well as by those in every division of age, education, economic status, and geographic region.

[287] In early January 2016, TransCanada announced it would initiate an ISDS claim under NAFTA against the United States, seeking $15 billion in damages and calling the denial of a permit for Keystone XL "arbitrary and unjustified".