Completion of long awaited Keystone XL oil pipeline delayed again, after judge cancels permit

Effort to build the Keystone XL crude oil pipeline was set back this week when a federal judge cancelled a key permit. 

The project has been years in the making – with its completion delayed by a series of setbacks for supporters of fossil fuel and efforts to make the U.S. less dependent on foreign energy.

Green energy advocates and other critics argue the Canadian oil and pipeline construction hurt the environment.

President Trump campaign in 2016 on getting the pipeline completed. Delays included environmental impact studies during the Obama administration. 

In the most recent setback, Judge Brian Morris said Wednesday that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers failed to adequately consider effects on endangered species such as pallid sturgeon, a massive, dinosaur-like fish that lives in rivers the pipeline would cross, according to the Associated Press.

However, the ruling does not stop work at the U.S.-Canada border in Montana. The pipeline is expected to stretch from the border to Nebraska.

The pipeline was proposed in 2008 and would carry up to 830,000 barrels of crude daily to Nebraska, where it would be transferred to another pipeline for shipment to refineries and export terminals on the Gulf of Mexico, the wire service also reports.