http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48697280#.UC2pqqmPUbc

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The Canadian pipeline company TransCanada has quietly begun construction of the southern leg of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, installing segments near Livingston, Texas, company officials confirmed Thursday.

"Construction started on Aug. 9. So we've now started construction in Texas," TransCanada spokesman Shawn Howard told the Los Angeles Times.

The southern section of the pipeline received government approval in July.

The first in a series of protests also was launched Thursday as opponents of the pipeline, designed to eventually carry diluted bitumen from the tar sands of northern Canada to refineries on the Texas Gulf Coast, unfurled protest banners at two equipment staging yards in Texas and Oklahoma.

"We just wanted to demonstrate that although they might be ready to begin, we would be ready to meet them," Ron Seifert, spokesman for Stop Tar Sands Blockade, said in an interview."