The long-running drama over an alleged conflict of interest in the Obama administration's review of the Keystone XL pipeline is reaching a climax today, hours ahead of the expected release of an independent inquiry into the charges.

At issue is green groups' alarm over past work done for the company behind the controversial Canada-to-U.S. pipeline by Cardno ENTRIX, the private contractor also hired by the State Department to lead the environmental review of the $7 billion project.

Although Keystone XL sponsor TransCanada Corp. and State both denied that any partiality was behind the administration's finding of no significant impact from building the pipeline -- a conclusion effectively walked back by the White House's delay and ultimate rejection of the oil line -- conservationists had ramped up their efforts with a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for Cardno's contract.

After telling Friends of the Earth that it had located contracts relevant to the XL review, State reversed course this week. In an email exchange released by the green group, FOIA officer Tangie Ellis declined to release any documents, telling Friends of the Earth legal director Marcie Keever that "unfortunately the Department of State isn't one of the agency [sic] that handle this kind of request."

Keever vowed to continue pushing for the public release of the Cardno ENTRIX contracts. "It's not clear whether gross incompetence or willful disregard for the law is at play, but either way, the result is the same: the public is being denied its right to see a document that could reveal serious problems in the review of the Keystone XL pipeline," she said in a statement.

Yet the conflict-of-interest debate over Keystone XL, which House Republicans are preparing to push legislatively past a presidential veto next week as part of their two-year transportation bill, is likely to flare this week despite the outcome of the FOIA bid.

State's independent inspector general is nearly ready to release a probe of how the department handled the pipeline review that was requested by a group of Democratic lawmakers after the Cardno ENTRIX flap first emerged last year, according to sources on and off Capitol Hill (E&ENews PM, Nov. 7, 2011).

Cardno ENTRIX, which worked with State on the environmental reviews of two other pipelines that would carry Canadian oil sands crude to U.S. refineries, signed a statement in 2008 disavowing any "past, present or currently planned interest or activity" that could impede its ability to impartially assess the proposed pipeline.

Yet, Friends of the Earth and other green groups countered that the contractor was working for TransCanada on a natural gas pipeline at the same time as it conducted the XL review, questioning whether a finding of "no significant impact" on the now-famous pipeline might have played into its ability to gain future contracts.

A State spokeswoman, asked for comment on the FOIA denial, said via email that the agency "takes FOIA requests very seriously and works to fulfill them completely."