Organizations opposed to the Keystone XL pipeline are pointing to a September oil spill that leaked 865,000 gallons of oil (at least 20,600 barrels) across seven acres a North Dakota farm as an example of what a spill of the same magnitude would mean for landowners along the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline route.

Halliburton Energy Services has agreed to plead guilty and pay the maximum fine for destroying evidence in the Deepwater Horizon disaster, U.S. Justice Department announced yesterday.

Although the ability of the oil industry to respond effectively to a spill has substantially improved – largely due to lessons learned by the industry and tougher government regulations – the job of ensuring safety is far from finished.

“Are you willing to risk Nebraska’s future for foreign profit?” asks one of the state’s farmers, in one of the national TV ads launched this week by a coalition of groups opposed to the Keystone XL pipeline.