USA

Congress Sends Keystone Pipeline Bill to Obama

FILE - A depot used to store pipes for TransCanada Corp.'s planned Keystone XL oil pipeline is seen in Gascoyne, North Dakota, Nov. 14, 2014.

The U.S. House of Representatives has approved the Keystone XL pipeline project and sent the measure to President Barack Obama, who has said he will veto it.

The House voted 270-152 to pass the bill Wednesday. It follows an affirmative vote in the Senate on January 29.

Republicans made approving the Keystone XL pipeline one of their top priorities when they took control of Congress in January.

Neither the House nor the Senate passed the proposal by a wide enough margin to override the expected presidential veto.

First proposed in 2008, the Keystone XL pipeline oil runs from Canada to the U.S. Gulf.

Republicans and the oil industry have argued that the $8 billion infrastructure project is about jobs and boosting energy security, by importing oil from a friendly neighbor and shipping it to domestic refineries subject to stringent environmental regulations.

Democrats, and their environmental allies, have characterized it as a gift to the oil industry that would worsen global warming and subject parts of the U.S. to the risks of an oil spill.