Army Corps Grants Permit for Line 5 Pipeline Construction in Straits of Mackinac | Columbus Ohio Dump Trucks
Pipelines
The project is still being deliberated by a state-level court
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has issued a permit for construction of a four-mile-long tunnel to house a pipeline under the Strait of Mackinac.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a permit Aug. 12 to Canadian energy giant Enbridge for construction of Line 5, a controversial four-mile-long tunnel along the bottom of the Straits of Mackinac to fully enclose twin oil and gas pipelines.
Even with the federal permit in hand, the project, part of a 645-mile pipeline that extends between Superior, Wis., and Sarnia, Ontario, will not start right away. The Michigan Supreme Court on July 31 vacated the state Public Service Commission's December 2023 approval—asserting that it had not properly applied the Michigan Environmental Protection Act when reviewing the proposed project.
The Corps stated in its 54-page decision that unnel construction complies with all applicable federal laws and regulations, including environmental, cultural, engineering and dump trucks columbus oh community requirements, and authorizes Enbridge to columbus oh dump truck work within federally-regulated waters. The Corps does not regulate design or operation of the pipeline itself or anything transported within it.
The permit was granted under a Trump administration’initiative, which Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works Adam Telle said in a statement is “cutting unneeded red tape” and “accelerates the delivery of critical infrastructure.”
The project approval reflects "more than six years of rigorous, comprehensive [Corps] review,” Enbridge spokesperson Ryan Duffy said in an email.
Bay Mills Indian Community President Whitney Gravelle, whose Tribal organization has been fighting the project over that same period, called the decision "shameful" and "a profound breach of the United States’ treaty trust responsibility to Tribal Nations."
She referenced the 1836 Treaty of Washington in which the Ottawa and Chippewa (Ojibwe) nations ceded nearly 14 million acres, about 40% of the Michigan Territory to the U.S., which enabled Michigan to become a state in 1837. In exchange, the U.S. promised money, goods, and continued hunting and fishing rights.
"They disregarded our treaty rights, ignored the information we provided through consultation, and pushed past cultural resource obligations under the manufactured excuse of an ‘energy emergency,'" said Gravelle.
Earthjustice, a nonprofit organization proving legal representation to the tribe on the project, calls the project a danger to the environment.
"Enbridge’s proposal to run a hazardous liquids pipeline through a confined underground tunnel has never been attempted anywhere else in the world," it said, [and] "would turn the Straits of Mackinac—a sacred site of creation for Anishinaabe tribes–into a construction zone for more than six years, threatening permanent destruction."
The overall pipeline project, estimated to cost $500 million in 2019, has soared in costs to more than $750-million according to earlier ENR reporting.
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Annemarie Mannion is editor of ENR Midwest, which covers 11 states. She joined ENR in 2022 and reports from Chicago.