Michigan, company reach oil pipeline deal

“This answers the demand we’ve heard from the public to protect the Great Lakes and at the same time provide some consistent reliability for energy,” Keith Creagh, director of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, told the AP.

Enbridge spokesman Ryan Duffy said the company, based in Calgary, Alberta, “has operated Line 5 safely and reliably for decades” and co-operated with state regulators, although Snyder and other officials previously have accused Enbridge of being less than forthcoming — particularly about the coating gaps.

“We believe this agreement makes a safe pipeline even safer,” Duffy said.

The deal, reached as Snyder’s term winds down, is sure to be a contentious issue in the campaign to succeed him. Democratic nominee Gretchen Whitmer has pledged to shut down Line 5 if elected governor in November. Her Republican opponent, state Attorney General Bill Schuette, has endorsed the tunnel option.

Environmental groups promised a fight as rumours of the agreement spread in recent days. They contend the only safe course is to reroute Enbridge’s oil away from the straits.

“Michigan gets nothing in this deal except a continued unacceptable risk to our water, while Enbridge continues to rake in massive profits and use our state as a shortcut for Canadian oil,” Sean McBrearty of Clean Water Action said during a Lansing rally this week.

It wasn’t immediately clear whether the next administration would have legal authority to undo the agreement. Michigan owns the straits bottomlands and granted Enbridge an easement when the pipes were laid in 1953. Creagh said any effort to revoke it would trigger a lengthy and expensive court battle.

The agreement includes provisions intended to reduce the likelihood of a leak from the existing pipes while the tunnel is built and to ensure close collaboration between Enbridge and the state after the new pipeline becomes operational, officials said.

Among them: underwater inspections to detect potential leaks and evaluate pipe coating; placement of cameras at the straits to monitor ship activity and help enforce a no-anchoring zone; a pledge that Enbridge personnel will be available during high-wave periods to manually shut down the pipelines if electronic systems fail; and steps to prevent leaks at other places where Line 5 crosses waterways.

Additionally, the deal calls for negotiating a public-private partnership between the company and the Mackinac Bridge Authority, the state agency that oversees the suspension bridge traversing the straits between Michigan’s upper and lower peninsulas near the underwater pipes.

The bridge authority would help Enbridge obtain government permits for the tunnel and replacement pipeline and would assume ownership of the tunnel when completed. The agency would lease the tunnel to Enbridge for its pipeline and could work out similar arrangements with operators of electric and telecommunications cables.

The agreement also includes a process for dealing with the existing oil lines after they’re deactivated, although it leaves open the question of how much of the pipe material will be removed.

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Follow John Flesher on Twitter at: twitter.com/johnflesher

John Flesher, The Associated Press

by Canadian Press

Michigan, company reach oil pipeline deal

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