Digital Media analysis

Digital Media analysis

 

Different views on the Keystone XL Pipeline

 

The three sources we have chosen consist of an objective article from BBC, a YouTube-film featuring Bill McKibben who is against the Keystone XL and lastly an informative text pro the pipeline, written by the company behind it, TransCanada. BBC News gives an objective view, with strictly informative writing. In the article from BBC about the project they discuss the issue from different opinions and facts. The video of Bill McKibben and TransCanada’s press text are far more subjective, displaying clear, sometimes radical opinions.

 

TransCanada is the company proposing to build the pipeline through North America, and therefor they have much to gain financially from the project. This shows clearly in their text, as they do not raise any negative concerns about the environment and only stress the positive outcomes such as the jobs this project will create. TransCanada are also very withdrawn about mentioning their own financial possibilities compared to the opportunities to restore the stability of the American economy.

 

In contrast to the economical and job summoning possibilities, environmental activists claim there is a major threat to the climate of the world and the obstructed nature life of the US. Bill McKibben an environmentalist fighting against the Keystone XL so badly that he has already been sent to jail for summoning a protest surrounding the white house. He propagates passionately for the terrible outcomes that might occur on our planet and the US if this pipeline is built and Canada keeps working on the oil sands. He cites Jim Hansen, expert at NASA, saying that exploiting the Canadian oil sands would result in a “game over” for the environment.

 

These media sources do not only feature different focuses, they also find different angles on the same points. Whilst TransCanada claims the building of the pipeline would create 13 000 jobs and 118 000 “spin-off jobs”, McKibben predicts fewer jobs and claims the construction jobs are only temporary. According to him and his fellow activists, the purpose of a pipeline is making transport of oil easier, and human work unnecessary.

 

The reasons these sources argue against each other are mostly due to ideological and financial differences. TransCanada has an obvious conflict of interest, since the approval of their pipeline would mean a blossoming billion-dollar industry. McKibben on the other hand has practically nothing to gain personally from his protests. His only motive is his passion for our planet.

 

Karoline Hermansson, Douglas Persson and Bianca Merckling

 

 

Reference List:

BBC News (08/11 2011) “State department faces Keystone XL review”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-15631968

(Accessed on 9 December 2011)

 

TransCanada Corporation (18/11 2011) “Key Projects, Oil Pipelines, Keystone Pipeline Project”

http://transcanada.com/keystone.html

(Accessed on 9 December 2011)

 

 

Democracy Now (23/08 2011) “Bill McKibben: Why I Spent 2 Days in Jail Protesting the Keystone XL Tar Sands Oil Pipeline”

(Accessed on 9 December)

 

 

Deborah and Christina’s group

Karoline Hermansson, Douglas Persson and Bianca Merckling

Digital Media Analysis

Richard Walls & Christina McKay

The company behind the Keystone Xl pipeline, Trans Canada corp., has written a post on their website on how the keystone pipeline will create jobs and opportunities for a lot of people through-out USA. In their article Trans Canada claim to be able to create 7000 new jobs in the manufacturing process, and another 118000 spin-off jobs. The article never mentions any negative views on the pipeline. This is because Trans Canada is the company behind the pipeline and of course, they want it to look good.

As our second source, we found an article on the Greenpeace website, arguing against the pipeline. Greenpeace mentions that the use of oil in USA has declined the last years, rendering an oil pipeline obsolete. Greenpeace is opposed to the pipeline because of their bias to solve the environmental crisis.

Lastly, we chose a neutral source, the Guardian from the UK. They are a respectable source of news and report the news unbiased. Seeing as they are situated in the UK, it is even more certain that they will not present any opinions since the pipeline does not affect UK directly. The Guardian’s report on the pipeline presented both positive and negative effects of the pipeline. They mentioned that the pipeline will create jobs and also that Canada is a neighbour of USA and they are closely related, which would make the oil “ethical” as they put it in the article. The Guardian also mentioned the negative effects, such as the decline of oil use in the USA, but also the risks of the pipeline. An older pipeline, called just “keystone” has had 14 leaks in just a year.

It becomes quite clear that the same news story can be told from different perspectives. If you were to only read the article from Trans Canada you would think that the pipeline is one of the best-proposed projects in a long time. While if you were to only read the Greenpeace article the pipeline is just a waste of money and a strain on the environment. The different sources are not lying; they are just choosing not to tell the entire truth and choose arguments that will gain their opinion. The Guardian is very clearly neutral, they present the positive effects and the negative effects and lets the reader decide on their opinion.

Reference list:

Greenpeace, 2011. U.S Gasoline Use Declining. [online] (13 October 2011) avaliable at: <http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/news-and-blogs/campaign-blog/usgasoline-use-declining-keystone-xl-pipeline/blog/37320/ >[Acessed 9 December 2011].



The Guardian UK, 2011. Q&A: Keystone XL oil pipeline. [online] (4 November 2011) Avaliable at: <http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/nov/04/qa-keystone-xl-oil-pipeline

> [Acessed 9 December 2011].

TransCanada, 2011. [online] (18 November 2011) Avaliable at: <http://www.transcanada.com/keystone.html> [Acessed 9 December 2011]

Jakob Wedenborn, Camilla Bratt Forss & Astrid Andersson

Digital Media Anlysis

To Christina McKay and Richard Walls

The Keystone XL Pipeline Project – Digital Media Analysis

 

     The Keystone XL project involves the construction of a transcontinental oil pipeline from the tar sand fields of Alberta in Canada to the port of Houston on the Gulf of Mexico. Which purpose the project has is to provide a cost efficient transport system for the oil produced from the tar sands found in Alberta. As the project is controversial, there has been a lot of debate around its political, environmental, economic and regional security implications. The perspectives and opinions vary between different stakeholders depending on the ideology, political background and how each group is personally affected by the project. Below the analysis will discuss the views of the project from an environmental, conservative and national affair columnist’s perspective.

 

     Among conservatives, the main issues are access to cheap oil, creation of job opportunities and national energy security. Political ideology is the most important factor explaining the views of this group. They see the US as an independent nation that should never have to rely on any foreign nation in any material respect. That is why they support the project. Environmental concerns are only seen as absurd expressions of the Obama administration.

 

     The views of the conservatives are the complete opposite of those of the environmentalist groups who see many risks associated with the project. Among these are increased greenhouse emissions, the dirty extracting of oil from tar sands and the risk of oil spills from the pipeline. The reason why their believes differ from the conservatives is that they take a more global and responsible view of the role of the US in the world. This group also tense to be a well educated and over represented on the east and west coast. 

 

     A national affairs columnist naturally needs to be objective in his writing and not be bound by any particular ideology as compared with the two sources above. He focuses on the national political scene and the decisions made by their nations political leaders.  Most politicians are relatively indifferent and are able to see both benefits and disadvantages of the project. They see the positive benefits of job creation, energy security and other benefits. At the same time they need to consider the opinions of the people to not upset their voters. 

 

     To analyze any given text it is critical to fully understand the background, ideology and the self-interest of the particular stakeholder. This is evident in the examples described above.

 

 

 

 

Simpson J, 2011. Pipeline-altering Lessons . [online] (16 November 2011) Available at: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/jeffrey-simpson/pipeline-altering-lessons/article2237344/ [Accessed 8 December 2011]

 

Macquain B, 2011. Energy Security and the Keystone XL Pipeline. [online] (25 August 2011) Available at: http://www.conservativecommune.com/2011/08/energy-security-and-the-keystone-xl-pipeline/ [Accessed 8 December 2011]

 

 

Stemwell O, 2011. Valparaiso University Fights the Keystone XL Pipeline. [online] (4 November 2011) Available at: http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/news-and-blogs/campaign-blog/valparaiso-university-fights-the-keystone-xl-/blog/37680/ [Accessed 9 Decemeber 2011]

Oil Pipeline

Richard Walls and Christina Mckay

Image Analysis

http://www.conservativecommune.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Keystone-XL-pipeline.png   

The conservatory, Mcquain B., 2011 Energy Security and the Keystone XL Pipeline

     

     The citizens are concerned for which consequences the pipeline may occur; meanwhile some of the politicians try to calm the people by showing the benefits of the project. The photograph is taken from the conservative commune´s website. They are positive and advocate the benefits of the pipeline and claim that it will create new construction and manufacturing jobs and an eco-friendly oil transportation. Besides this, it will also improve the energy security in the US. The positive atmosphere is strengthened by the bright blue sky which clarifies the pipelines harmless impact on the environment. In addition to this, there is also obvious that by putting the workers in the center, the photographer intend to show that the project will result in many new job opportunities. As the picture only shows the benefits of the project the picture appears one-sided.

     

     The one-sided appearance hides the many disadvantages with the project. Although the project will create new job opportunities, which will affect the economy in a positive way, the majority of these jobs are only temporary during the building-process. The pipeline itself may not affect the environment in a direct way.  Indirectly the extraction of the oil will release the double amount of greenhouse gases compared to ordinary oil extraction, since it is extracted from tar sand. This will aggravate the greenhouse effect even more. Another disadvantage is how the route is planed to cross sensitive aquifers in Nebraska, which provides drinking water for the inhabitants. If the pipeline may break it could end up in a huge catastrophe. The question is, why did the photographer choose to show only the positive side of the project?

     

      Similar to a coin this project will equal both advantages and disadvantages, and not just benefits as the image shows. The intension of this picture is to overshadow all the negative consequences and only let the positive benefits influence the citizens´ opinions. To try to convince the people by hiding the disadvantages may be a winning, but an ugly concept to carry through the project and their will.

Mcquain,B., 2011.Energy Security and the Keystone XL Pipeline. [electronic print] Available at: <http://www.conservativecommune.com/2011/08/energy-security-and-the-keystone-xl-pipeline/> [Accessed 8 December 2011]

Digital Media Analysis

                              Digital Media Analysis by Sofia, Ebba H. and Linnea

Richard Walls and Jeanette Clayton’s group

Three different sources from YouTube, a blog and TransCanada’s official website argue for different perspectives about the Keystone XL pipeline. The YouTube source presents three different environmentally active people and they explain the negative effects the pipeline will have on the environment, such as the increased carbon dioxide level. Mike Tidwell, founder and director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network claims that saying no to the KXL could mean that “finally we're turning a corner on our dirty energy addiction"(Mike Tidwell, 2011). TransCanada believes that KXL is too important for the economy. The U.S.A. uses five million barrels of oil more than they import per day. The crude oil is a very important energy source for the US and the oil pipeline would secure the country’s oil supply (TransCanada, 2011). A conservative blog written by a majoring in advanced conservative studies discusses how the KXL is important to provide jobs (Conservative Blogs Central, 2011).

The YouTube clip is angled the way it is because the participants are environmental workers and one of them comes from Wisconsin that is severely affected by climate changes and does not want to become worse (Mike Tidwell, 2011). TransCanada are affected by the fact that they are working with KXL pipelines, they have already produced material that is needed and it would therefore be a waste of money to throw it away (TransCanada, 2011). The blogger’s ideology is affecting the perspective of the text by having other political opinions than Obama (Conservative Blogs Central, 2011). All of the sources are only arguing for their own opinion and do not include other perspectives. The people presented in the sources are well education in their own area. However, they do not have enough knowledge of the other parts fields to make an un biased statement.   

It was easier to find arguments against the KXL pipeline because the media provides the demonstrators more attention. The environmental questions are a sensitive matter since it is a very central question. Moreover, the possible applicants for the jobs are not being heard but only governmental people speaking for them. Because of moral reasons scattered parts of the society that need employment may deny the jobs. This is neither brought up in the media. In conclusion, it is difficult to be un objective in the KXL discussion since the options includes a strong stand point.   

                                                                                                           

      Sources   

The blog

http://conservativeblogscentral.blogspot.com/2011/11/obama-cares-about-re-election-while.html

The YouTube clip

The official website

http://www.transcanada.com/keystone.html

Josefin, Sofia & Jarik. Image analysis

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Hello! 

Our group misunderstood where we should put in our "Image analysis". We thought it should be in the "group page", but we realized it was wrong.
Hope it is okay. 

Teachers: Ann & Alexandra 

All best.

Jarik Bulavko