HOUSTON -- Environmentalists said today they would back challenges against eminent domain declarations in hopes of stopping construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, including a southern portion announced yesterday.

The groups spoke one day after pipeline developer TransCanada announced it would forge ahead with a link between oil storage hubs in Cushing, Okla., and Houston refineries (Greenwire, Feb. 27).

The groups say TransCanada's true intent is to use Houston and Port Arthur, Texas, refining centers as a conduit for sending Canadian oil sands crude abroad. The environmentalists plan to latch themselves onto legal challenges against TransCanada's eminent domain claims in Texas and elsewhere as a central focus in their efforts to block the project (E&ENews PM, Feb. 27).

"Our point is pretty basic: TransCanada will do anything and say anything to get their pipeline built," said Jane Kleeb, executive director of the advocacy group Bold Nebraska.

Kleeb says TransCanada officials lied when they told Nebraska landowners that their company has eminent domain rights to force pipeline easements through private properties.

In a conference call with reporters today, representatives of four environmental organizations -- Bold Nebraska, the Natural Resources Defense Council, 350.org and the Sierra Club -- said they believe they have a strong legal case against the company on eminent domain issues. The company is seeking to use condemnation power against a north Texas farmer.

The groups' main argument is that, as a nonpublic entity looking to build a project for profit, TransCanada does not qualify for eminent domain power in most states.

"In Texas, a company has to be considered a common carrier, which I think is the speaking point for a lot of landowners down there, that TransCanada is not a common carrier," Kleeb said. "They are a foreign oil company that -- that it's essentially a private oil company."

The campaigners are also hoping to capitalize on fears of rising crude prices to block the pipeline.

Though industry opinion is mixed on the pipeline's potential impact on U.S. gasoline prices, the environmentalists contend that it would raise prices in the Midwest by shifting abundant crude oil supplies to the Gulf Coast, which still relies on more expensive foreign imported oil.

Susan Casey-Lefkowitz, international program director at the Natural Resources Defense Council, argued that TransCanada's moves to build the southern portion of Keystone constitute a "ploy to avoid a review that would show how the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline would raise U.S. oil prices."

TransCanada officials estimate they have about 95 percent of the easements they need for the Cushing-to-Houston leg.