The American Petroleum Institute (API) and 20 industry partners on both sides of the border are pushing back at environmentalists' organized campaign against development of heavy Canadian crude with a new public relations website dubbed "Oil Sands Fact Check."

The "fact check" messaging project allows members, including the National Association of Manufacturers, the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers and the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, to parry smaller-scale conservationist critiques in as close to real time as possible. While the $5.3 billion Keystone XL project linking the Albertan oil sands with Gulf Coast refineries remains the biggest proving ground for battle between greens and industry, API manager Cindy Schild said the site would host responses to the full panoply of issues related to the Canadian fuel.

"Will there be and are there issues that come up about Keystone? Sure," she said. "But there can be other pipeline projects and false accusations."

The site's most recent posts seek to debunk specific claims made in a Sierra Club video on oil sands extraction and a Natural Resources Defense Council report that warned of potential New England consequences from an Enbridge Energy Partners LP proposal to reverse the flow of two pipelines that do not cross the border (EnergyWire, June 20).

Some of the "fact checks" take a selective approach to help make the industry's case for expanded production and U.S. consumption of oil-sands crude, which U.S. EPA has estimated generates 82 percent more emissions than conventional fuel on a "well-to-tank" basis. But the gap narrows considerably when "well-to-wheels" life-cycle pollution is considered.

For instance, the post on the Sierra Club states, "We have no idea what 'toxic additives'" the green group argues are mixed with oil sands to create usable fuel. But standard industry practices for producing usable crude from the thick oil sands involve diluting it with chemicals toxic to humans, typically a distillate product such as naphtha, to enable its shipment through pipelines (Greenwire, Aug. 23, 2011).

Other elements of the "fact check" website take aim at similar talking points often used to great effect by environmentalists, including the description of Keystone XL and other specific pipes as designated for oil-sands crude. "Truth is: pipelines carry various grades of oil from different sources and are not distinguished as oil sands or non-oil-sands lines," the site states, correctly reflecting the challenge of shipping crude with different chemical properties through the same pipes.

Keystone XL, for example, is set to transport up to 100,000 barrels per day of crude from North Dakota's Bakken region -- which tends to be lighter than oil-sands fuel -- in addition to its 730,000-barrel maximum capacity from Canada.