Building an underground tunnel for an aging Enbridge oil pipeline that extends over a Great Lakes channel can destroy Wetlands and cause damage to bat habitats, but would scrap the chances of a boot anchor that the line is cracking and a catastrophous leakage, SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDEN SEIDENS SEIDEN THE US VANGANCHACE LEKKAGAGAGAGE SEIDENTE THE US VAN VANGANCHACE LEKKAGAGAGAGE SEIDE's Lekkage Seiden Seide proposed process of the proposed project.
The analysis moves the corps a step closer to approving the tunnel for line 5 in the Mackinac street. The tunnel was proposed in 2018 for an amount of $ 500 million, but was bogged down by legal challenges. The Corps accelerated the project in April after President Donald Trump ordered federal agencies in January to identify energy projects for accelerated emergency permit.
A definitive environmental assessment is expected by autumn, with a permit decision to follow later this year. The office initially intended to give a permit decision in early 2026.
With that permit in hand, Enbridge would only need permission from the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy before it could start building the tunnel. However, that is far from a given.
Environmental activists have put pressure on the state to refuse the permit. In the meantime, the attorney general of Michigan Dana Nessel and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to win judicial statements that Enbridge would force the existing pipeline to remove from the street forever.
The construction could have major effects on short, long -term
The analysis notes that the tunnel would eliminate the risk that a boot anchor would tear the pipeline and cause a leak in the street, an important care for environmental activists. But the construction would have radical effects on everything, from recreation to wild animals.
Many of the effects, such as noise, vistas that are marred by 400 feet cranes (121 meters), building lights that affect star chances in Headlands International Dark Sky Park and vibrations that would disrupt the aquatic wildlife in the wild would end when the work was completed, the report thought.
Other effects would last longer, including the loss of wetlands and vegetation on both sides of the street that connects Lake Huron and Lake Michigan, and the loss of nearly 300 trees that use the northern long-ear and tricolored bat to pour. Assessment and excavation can also disrupt or destroy archaeological locations.
The tunnel-soring machine can cause vibrations that can shift the geology of the area. The soil in the construction area could be polluted and nearly 200 truck trips daily during the six -year construction period would break down the roads in the area, the analysis showed. Gas mixing with water that seeps into the tunnel can lead to an explosion, but the analysis notes that Enbridge plans to install fans to properly ventilate the tunnel during the count.
Enbridge has promised to meet all safety standards, where possible to replant vegetation and contain erosion, noted the analysis. The company also said that it would try to limit the loudest work until during the day as much as possible, and compensate for damage to Wetlands and protected species by buying credits through mitigatie banks. That money can then be used to finance restoration in other areas.
“Our goal is to have the smallest possible environmental footprint,” said Enbridge officials in a statement.
The Sierra club issued a statement on Friday stating that the tunnel remains 'an existential threat'.
“The chances of an oil slick in the big lakes – our most valuable freshwater source – skyrockets when this tunnel is built in the street,” the group said. “We can't drink oil. We can't fish or swim in oil.”
Julie Goodwin, a senior lawyer at Earthjustice, a environmental network group who opposed the project, said that the corps could still happen the consequences of a leak that could still happen on either side of the street, did not consider whether the oil flow could stop due to the big lakes.
“My most important take -away restaurants are that the Army Corps has set that blinkers are employed by Enbridge and the fossil fuel agenda of President Trump,” she said.
Tunnel would protect the part of line 5 by Straits
Enbridge uses the line 5 pipeline to transport crude oil and natural gas fluids between Superior, Wisconsin and Sarnia, Ontario, since 1953. About 4 miles (6 kilometers) of the pipeline runs along the bottom of the street of Mackinac.
The concern about the aging pipeline that tears and causes a potentially disastrous leak in the street have built over the past decade. Those fears became more intense in 2018 when an anchor damaged the line.
Enbridge argues that the line remains structurally healthy, but it concluded a deal with the then government of Michigan Rick Snyder calling in the company to replace the Straits section of the line with a new section that would be encapsulated in a protective underground tunnel.
Enbridge and environmental activists spar in the court fighting
Environmental activists, Indian tribes and Democrats have been fighting before the court for years to stop the tunnel and force Enbridge to remove the existing pipeline from the street. They have had little success so far.
A court of appeal in Michigan in February validated the permits of the state of Public Service Commission for the tunnel. Nessel suggested in 2019 and tried to make the servitude too invalid so that rule 5 can walk through the street. That case is still being processed. Whitmer withdrew the easement in 2020, but Enbridge challenged that decision and a Federal Court of Appeal in April ruled that the case could continue.
Another legal fight for line 5 in Wisconsin
About 12 miles (19 kilometers) of line 5 runs over the Bad River Band or Lake Superior Chippewa's Reserve in North WISCONSIN. In 2019, that tribe complained to forcing Enbridge to remove the line from the reservation, with the argument that it is susceptible to spilles and those easements that can work on the reservation in 2013.
Enbridge has presented a 41-mile (66 kilometers) around the reservation. The tribe has brought a lawsuit to make the building permits of the State too invalid for the project and has joined various other groups when challenging the permits by the disputed case process of the state.
