LOS ANGELES -- The controversial Keystone XL pipeline will be approved after November's election, an industry leader predicted yesterday.

President Obama's decision to deny a permit for the pipeline should be looked at as a temporary holdup, said Rick Grafton, CEO and chief investment officer at Calgary, Alberta-based Grafton Asset Management.

"It was very much a political decision from the U.S. government," Grafton said. "It wasn't a timely decision.

"The XL pipeline will be approved next year after the elections," Grafton added.

Grafton made the forecast as he and other industry experts debated the future of oil shale and natural gas, mineral development and nuclear power during a panel discussion at the Milken Institute Global Conference. Several shared the view that the relationship between Canada and the United States on energy could change the global landscape.

Grafton did not elaborate on why he believed the Keystone XL pipeline permit will be approved after November, or whether it will happen under either an Obama second term or the election of presumed Republican nominee Mitt Romney.

But the Keystone denial shouldn't cool cooperation on energy, said Amir Adnani, president and CEO of Uranium Energy Corp., a U.S.-based uranium mining company.

"The Canadians shouldn't get too upset about the Keystone pipeline," Adnani said. "We all know it was political. We all know it was an election year, so we shouldn't focus too much on it."

Instead, Adnani said, energy experts should be looking at the fact that there are 7 billion people in the world and that the global population will grow to 10 billion. That calls out for progressive energy policies, he said.

Creating global market

The discovery of vast amounts of natural gas is a "game changer," said Kevin Lynch, vice chairman of BMO Financial Group. But companies operating in Canada need the infrastructure to move supplies to the West Coast, where it can be shipped to Japan, China and India.

Those countries pay more for natural gas than the record-low numbers in North America, Lynch said.

"There isn't a single price," for natural gas, Lynch said. It's $2 per 1,000 cubic feet in North America, $16 in Japan and $8 to $9 in continental Europe.

If the liquefied fuel could be shipped from North America to those markets, he said, it would be "closer to one price."

"Canadian oil in the U.S. trades at quite a discount," Lynch said. "From a Canadian perspective, it doesn't maximize the return. That's why Keystone is so important. It would have taken [supplies} down to Gulf [of Mexico] refineries."

Moderator Conrad Kiechel, director of communications at the Milken Institute, asked whether energy companies would rather sell to the west or the south.

"Whoever pays us the highest price," Grafton said.

The Obama administration's decision to deny a permit for the pipeline has in the short term rocked the industry and created uncertainty for companies and their investors, the company leaders said.

But it also created opportunities, Grafton said.

"Now we are not only thinking about how to get gas; we're thinking about how to get oil," Grafton said. "This wouldn't have been done without that decision."

In terms of the pipeline rejection, panel members assigned blame to politicians, regulators and themselves.

It takes far too long to gain approval for a project in the United States, Adnani said. When a company applies to mine a product, he said, there can be many different regulations that apply and several government bodies with oversight.

"It's not competitive with the rest of the world," Adnani said. "There needs to be more of a balance."

Different states have different roadblocks, he said, referring to Texas as the "People's Republic of Texas." It is very difficult to develop a uranium project in Texas, he said, compared with California.

"Each state and province is like its own country," Adnani said.

The projects companies want to develop in North America are competing for investors with developments in other countries, Adnani said.

"Look at Brazil," Adnani said. "Look at the amount of capital flowing in." The country, he said, has found balance between regulations and "having accountability" for the timing of approving regulation.

'Drillacon Valley'

In Alberta, Canada, there are new efforts to speed up the approval process, Lynch said. For "very large-scale projects," he said, that deadline is 24 months.

Environmental groups do not get as much time to appeal, he said. If there is one environmental study, they don't automatically get second one.

In fact, Grafton said, Alberta now has a new nickname among developers.

"We like to call Calgary 'Drillacon Valley,'" he said.

One person in the audience during questions said that regulations are necessary, given some of the concerns about fracking and the chemicals used in the water injected into rock formations.

The audience member said that he worked for farmers who "need a lot of water" and that extracting shale gas requires "trillions of gallons of water," with undisclosed chemicals. "That frightens me a bit," he said. "Regulation probably is important; 350 million people in this country need to eat and drink."

Regulation is important, Grafton said, but "it's the timing of things. Water issues, they've come a long way. They're making a greener fracking fluid.

"They need to get it to where it's drinkable," Grafton added. "It's at the front of the mind of all the energy companies and the regulators."

Push-back against development of oil shale also is the fault of industry, several on the panel said following a question from the audience.

A man who identified himself as a money manager said that investors don't want to invest in fracking because they "don't understand it" and don't want to invest in nuclear because it's "too risky.

"It comes down to bad PR, bad managing of it," the audience member said. "You haven't done a great job."

Adnani agreed.

"We companies and the industry need to do a better job," Adnani said. "We need to have clear energy policy." He asked, however, "Whose shoulders should it fall on?" and how companies could change minds in Washington, D.C.

"I don't see how individual company or individual sector is going to tackle what we're talking about here," Adnani said.

Adnani also predicted that nuclear power will expand in the United States, despite the black eye the industry suffered after the earthquake and tsunami in Japan triggered a nuclear plant meltdown last year.

The world has recognized, he said, that it is the only form of electricity generation that can provide baseload power and that is low-cost and emission-free.

"There's just no alternative to that," Adnani said.