The U.S. Senate’s recent failure to override President Obama’s veto of legislation approving the Keystone XL oil pipeline leaves the controversial project’s fate in the president’s hands. Obama has said he will make a final decision once the State Department finishes its assessment of whether or not the pipeline is in the national interest.

Some experts think that the amount of public attention the pipeline has received over the past six plus years has been a distraction from other, equally important issues related to North America’s energy boom.