iPolitics By iPolitics. Published on May 12, 2021 11:12am Enbridge offices (Mack Male via Flickr)
The Lead
Wednesday is a critical day for Enbridge’s Line 5 pipeline. May 12 marks 180 days since Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer “gave notice that the state was terminating a 1953 easement for the pipeline,” which carries oil to refineries in Ontario through Wisconsin and Michigan. Whitmer said Line 5 “poses an unacceptable risk of a catastrophic oil spill,” the National Observer reports.
Alternative modes of transport for the crude Line 5 currently transports are not favourable, according to Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan.
Using 18-wheelers, boats, and railway cars to transport oil would be “messy, polluting, and expensive,” O’Regan told CTV News Channel’s Power Play on Tuesday. “That’s a contingency plan that I don’t want to have to bank on.”