After Initial Permits Are Granted, Activists Worry About Impacts of Enbridge’s Line 5 Reroute in Northern Wisconsin

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources announced earlier this month that it approved Enbridge’s permits for its Line 5 reroute project. The permits are a step in a long list of necessary approvals for the energy company’s project, which aims to bypass the reservation of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. 

The Line 5 pipeline stretches 645 miles from Superior, Wisconsin, across northern Wisconsin and Michigan, to Sarnia, Ontario. The proposed reroute comes after the tribe sued Enbridge in 2019 to shut down and remove the 12-mile section of pipeline from their reservation in northern Wisconsin. The proposed reroute would stretch 41 miles around the southern side of the reservation. 

The DNR’s decision was condemned by the tribe and environmental groups, who view the route as a risk to the region’s environmental resources. 

“They’re just moving it further upstream,” tribal Vice Chairman Patrick Bigboy said. “They’re crossing many wetlands, they’re going to fill in some of the wetlands and all of this runs downstream. It’s going to affect our wildlife.”

The wetland and waterway permits DNR issued this month allow Enbridge to perform certain construction-related tasks that would impact waterways and wetlands. Those tasks involve blasting, horizontal drilling and trenching wetlands and streams along the new segment, much of it ceded territory where the tribe still has the right to hunt and fish. 

The DNR permits also include a stormwater discharge permit federal agencies require in order to make a decision regarding their own permitting process under the Clean Water Act. In addition to the federal permits from the Army Corps of Engineers, Enbridge may also need to secure additional permits from the Wisconsin DNR. 

Opponents Prepare for Legal Challenge

The permit has over 200 conditions and it will take a while for environmental lawyers to wade through, said Stefanie Tsosie, a senior attorney at Earthjustice who is representing the tribe.  

“This is not a foregone conclusion,” Tsosie said. “This is the first on a long list of things that [Enbridge] still needs.” 

But the permits are a significant step toward beginning construction on the new pipeline segment. Evan Feinauer, a staff attorney with Clean Wisconsin, said his team is reviewing the permits and ensuring the supporting documents follow state law. 

The EPA’s decision to give the federal clean water permit will likely occur in early 2025. Enbridge will need to provide certain documents to the DNR under the current permit as well as conduct a number of meetings with the agency before any shovels can enter the ground. The company did not provide an estimate for when they expect construction to begin.

It’s possible that environmental organizations will challenge the DNR’s permits in court. If that occurs, lawyers can ask the judge to halt any construction until the resolution of the case.

The Wisconsin DNR said the environmental impact statement it conducted addressed the impacts of the construction on the state’s waterways and that the analysis was given the appropriate consideration when making these permit decisions. 

Enbridge said in a statement that the permitting decisions came after almost five years of public input and will result in new jobs for the region. Enbridge also said the project will allow for the continued flow of crude oil and natural gas to the region. 

A previous analysis found that shutting down Line 5 entirely would have minimal impacts on natural gas prices throughout the region. Other existing infrastructure would be capable of handling the energy demand in the region.  

Ongoing Environmental Concerns 

The new section of the pipeline would stretch across a more pristine area of the state, Feinauer said. It’s also an area that has been experiencing more extreme rainfall and erosion due to climate change. 

“We want to be really careful about just assuming that we can do a major construction project there without causing significant problems,“ Feinauer said. 

The project would ultimately cross 186 waterways and 101 acres of wetlands. According to Rob Lee, a staff attorney with Midwest Environmental Advocates, moving the pipeline farther up the watershed means it’s ultimately crossing more rivers and wetlands that drain into Lake Superior. 

Many of these streams will be hard to access, according to Emma Holtan at the Superior Rivers Watershed Association. As storm events become more frequent and intense, the streams and rivers already struggle with erosion and sedimentation. The construction process would exacerbate these issues, especially in areas local groups have already prioritized for erosion control efforts. 

The Superior Rivers Watershed Association has already planned new water quality monitoring sites that are downstream of the proposed reroute. Monitoring these sites, which were chosen with input from Bad River’s natural resources department, will help establish a baseline understanding of the water quality so stakeholders can better understand any changes that may come with future construction. 

The reroute would also require blasting riverbeds, which could change the hydrology of the area. The wetlands themselves are very sensitive to human impacts; even compacting them can affect the services, such as flood protection, that they provide, according to Lee. 

Drilling under waterways can be dangerous. Should a crack in the bedrock form, the drilling fluid can leak into groundwater. In northern Wisconsin, there are a number of aquifers under artesian, or pressurized, conditions. When Enbridge was constructing Line 3 in Minnesota, their construction activities caused an aquifer breach. Many of these aquifers aren’t mapped in northern Wisconsin, according to Lee. 

“There’s a certain amount of hubris involved in saying we’re going to stick a 40-mile pipeline through the earth, and if we mess up these wetlands that nature has created over thousands of years, we’ll just put them back together again,” Feinauer said.