Alberta oil exports to Oklahoma have shot up billions of dollars since the Keystone pipeline was completed in 2011, but the economic benefits for the southwest state remain limited, experts say.

An analysis of Industry Canada trade data shows oil exports from Alberta to Oklahoma reached $3.4 billion in 2012, up from only $33 million in 2008. The spike happened in 2011, the same year the second phase of the Keystone pipeline running from Nebraska to Cushing, Okla. was completed. Attention is now focused on the approval of the pipeline’s extension to Texas.

With so much oil flowing through to the state of Oklahoma, the economic benefits for the state have been touted by some studies and politicians. But two economics professors say that the financial benefits are mostly short-term construction jobs.

It’s impossible to say an increase in oil imports will cause a specific net benefit to Oklahoma’s economy, said Andrew Leach, an environmental economist and professor at the Alberta School of Business. He said jobs aren’t long-term, and the one’s that are long-term are relatively few and far between.

Leach said it’s important to ask if Oklahoma is obtaining oil through the Alberta pipeline at a cheaper rate than if it had pursued other options.

“If you look at these things in a vacuum it’s this pipeline or nothing,” Leach said. “If TransCanada didn’t apply someone else would have.”

While the pipeline might ease the flow of oil for Alberta’s oil producers, Leach said the warehouse-style transportation does not mean discount prices for importers like Oklahoma. Just because oil is being refined in the Cushing area, it doesn’t mean those refineries would have sat empty without the pipeline. “Nobody runs a refinery because of a pipeline – it’s built because of production capacity,” he said.

Oklahoma is currently Alberta’s sixth-biggest American state for oil exports, accounting for six per cent of exports to the country. Exports to Texas sit at under $1 billion, but that’s expected to change if the Keystone pipeline is completed.

Alberta’s oil sands will bring in anywhere between $55 and $132 million per year to Oklahoma’s economy, according to a study by the independent Canadian Energy Research Institute. That same report also said Alberta’s oil would create or preserve anywhere from 640 to 1,520 jobs per year.

But reports like these might not always be as accurate as they claim to be, said Matthew Rousu, an economics professor at Susquehanna University in Pennsylvania. Rousu’s research includes reviewing the accuracy of economic impact studies.

Rousu said Oklahoma may benefit from temporary construction jobs or ongoing maintenance work, but “the bigger benefit almost seems like it would go to Alberta and whoever is extracting in the province.”

Rousu said economic impact studies are often used to mislead the public for political or corporate gain. It’s also difficult to accurately predict future economic benefits.

“You can’t look at it and say, this refinery is now processing oil, therefore all jobs are coming from the pipeline,” Leach said. Preserving and creating jobs are two different things. There might be a demand for oil-related jobs in the area that would be filled irrespective of Keystone’s expansion, he said.

The pipeline is “certainly not a multi-digit or multi-percent impact” on Oklahoma’s GDP, Leach said.