ENBRIDGE LINE 3: Trudeau government to decide this week

[Oscar]

Trudeau government to decide this week on Enbridge's massive pipeline project

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By Brent Patterson | November 21, 2016

The Trudeau government will make a major pipeline decision this week. By Nov. 25, it will have to rule on the massive $7.5-billion Line 3 pipeline to the U.S.

An approval by the federal government would allow Enbridge to build 1,600 kilometres of new pipeline from Hardisty, Alberta to Superior Wisconsin. The original Line 3 was built in 1968 and is nearing the end of its serviceability.

“The old pipeline will be decommissioned and left underground while a new larger pipeline is installed," Metro News reported.

The approval would increase the capacity of the pipeline by 370,000 barrels per day. It will go from its existing 390,000 bpd to 760,000 bpd and perhaps more significantly, it will allow it to switch from carrying light crude oil to heavier oil including diluted bitumen for another 50 to 60 years.

"Kevin Lee, an attorney with the Minnesota Centre for Environmental Advocacy, said it is disingenuous to call Line 3 a 'replacement' of existing infrastructure, because it carries so much more oil and it will travel on an entirely different route through his state. The new route also travels through a rich water environment and over some of the state's most pristine land." CBC reported.

Enbridge admits the pipeline would mean 19 to 26 megatonnes of upstream greenhouse gas emissions each year. Even with that, Robert Steedman, the NEB's chief environmental officer, said, "The Enbridge Line 3 project is in the Canadian public interest and is not likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects."

But Lee said that is not the case, "When you build fossil fuel infrastructure that lasts for 50 or 60 years, which will ship higher and higher volumes of the most carbon-intensive resource that exists, you're basically saying, 'We don't care about climate change.'"

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Brent Patterson is the Political Director at the Council of Canadians. He works with the Council's chairperson Maude Barlow, its campaigners, organizers and chapters across the country on trade, energy, water, and health care issues. The Council has political staff in Ottawa, Vancouver, Edmonton, Toronto, Halifax, Delhi, Cape Town and Mexico City.
You can follow Brent on Twitter @CBrentPatterson.