Developer rejects Trump’s Keystone pipeline proposal

The company hoping to build the Keystone XL oil pipeline is rejecting Donald Trump’s proposed deal to approve its construction.

Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, said Thursday that as president, he would approve the pipeline if the U.S. government got “a piece of the profits, because we’re making it happen.”

{mosads}But TransCanada Corp. on Friday said that’s not the way these projects are usually structured, and the company would expect any United States leader to abide by that.

“The role of the U.S. government in such transactions is that of a regulator — ensuring various laws and regulations are followed — and granting appropriate permits,” TransCanada spokesman James Millar said.

“We would expect to continue to follow this model that has been in place for decades.”

Millar said the United States would get great benefits from Keystone, amounting to an $8 billion private investment that is not backed by the government, plus the opportunity to get more oil from a friendly ally, among others.

President Obama in November rejected the permit for Keystone, which would have stretched from Alberta, Canada, to the United States’s Gulf coast.

He reasoned that the pipeline would hurt the nation’s standing on the international climate stage and bring little benefit to the country. The president has the power to review cross-border pipelines under a 2004 executive order.

TransCanada has sued the State Department in federal court to try to overturn Obama’s decision. It has also filed a challenge under the North American Free Trade Agreement, in which it is seeking billions of dollars it said it lost because of the rejection.