[thackney]

The Keystone XL includes loading points for the Bakken area.

It certainly would move a lot of Alberta oil/bitumen, but it plans to move oil out of ND as well.

There are several other pipelines planned as well, not to mention the majority of the Bakken Crude moves out on existing pipelines already.

[railroader]

The Keystone XL includes loading points for the Bakken area. It certainly would move a lot of Alberta oil/bitumen, but it plans to move oil out of ND as well. There are several other pipelines planned as well, not to mention the majority of the Bakken Crude moves out on existing pipelines already.

Exactly. A lot of the pipeline capacity will be used by the Alberta oil sands, so Bakken production will always exceed pipeline capacity, present or future. Since Bakken ships to more than just Texas and Louisiana refineries, and that there is little or no pipeline capacity to northeastern points, the railroad is the only way to go in some cases.

Warren Buffet's opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline may or may not have to do with him owning BNSF, but the railroads were getting crude oil business before the pipeline was even announced. They were able to do this because a lot of 30,000 gallon tank cars intended for ethanol service in the mid-2000s were left in storage. Now that the Bakken oil business is good for the railroads and shippers, new tank cars built for crude oil shipments are being purchased by leasing companies and at least one shipper (Phillips 66).