State Regulators Making Progress on Environmental Review of Enbridge's Line 5

Friday, June 23rd, 2023 -- 9:01 AM

(By Danielle Kaeding, Wisconsin Public Radio) State regulators say they’re making progress on an environmental review of Enbridge’s plans to relocate Line 5 as a federal judge has ordered a partial shutdown of the oil and gas pipeline on the Bad River reservation.

According to Danielle Kaeding with Wisconsin Public Radio, in 2020, the Canadian energy firm proposed rerouting its Line 5 pipeline after the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa sued the company in 2019 to shut down and remove the pipeline from tribal lands.

Enbridge wants to build a new 30-inch segment that would run 41 miles around the tribe’s reservation in Ashland and Iron counties, a project estimated to cost at least $450 million. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is revising its draft environmental impact statement for the rerouting plan, as well as analyzing the company’s application for waterway and wetland permits.

The DNR is currently addressing more than 32,000 comments on its draft review. Ben Callan, the agency’s integration services section manager, said that’s the most he’s seen in nearly two decades managing utility and energy projects.

Built in 1953, Line 5 carries up to 23 million gallons of light crude oil and natural gas liquids each day over a 645-mile span from Superior across northern Wisconsin and Michigan to Sarnia, Ontario.

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