WASHINGTON (Reuters) - TransCanada Corp's proposed reroute of its Canada-to-Nebraska Keystone XL oil pipeline avoids many sensitive ecological regions in the state, a report from the Nebraska environmental regulator said on Friday.
The U.S. State Department is working with Nebraska as it forms its own environmental assessment of the pipeline, which would link with the southern half of the project which is already under construction in Texas.
Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman, who received the report late on Thursday from state environment regulators, now has 30 days to review the report before deciding whether he supports the Keystone XL reroute.
The state report said the proposed reroute avoids the ecologically sensitive Sand Hills region but would still cross part of the massive Ogallala aquifer.
It added that any spills on the aquifer "should be localized and Keystone would be responsible for any cleanup," which would seemingly downplay worries from environmentalists that any spill would sully large parts of the Ogallala aquifer, an irrigation source to much of the U.S. breadbasket.
The U.S. State Department has said it will release in the near future its environmental assessment of the Keystone pipeline, a necessary step before the Obama administration is expected to decide the fate of the project in coming months. It did not immediately return inquiries on Friday about when it would release its report.
Once complete, the entire project would link Alberta's oil sands with refineries and ports in Texas.
President Barack Obama last year rejected TransCanada's initial Keystone XL application after environmentalists raised concerns in Nebraska.
Obama threw his support behind the southern half, which would drain a glut of U.S. crude in the middle of the country from a surge in output from new sources in places such as North Dakota.
The report said construction of the line in Nebraska would result in $418 million in economic benefits and support more than 4,500 new or existing jobs.
(Reporting by Timothy Gardner, Roberta Rampton, Ayesha Rascoe; Editing by Alden Bentley and Tim Dobbyn)
