Reporting by Laura Schulte, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Clean Wisconsin is contending the spill is unprecedented, and “one of the most dangerous” ever seen in the Northwoods, with more than 1.3 million gallons of hazardous liquids released. The environmental advocacy group contends Enbridge is continuing to burn off 5,000 barrels of chemicals at the site.
“We’ve said from the beginning that building an oil and gas pipeline puts Wisconsin’s Northwoods and the families who live there at tremendous risk,” said Clean Wisconsin attorney Evan Feinauer in a media release. “This dangerous, toxic spill shows the harmful consequences that can result from Line 5 pipeline work and construction.”
Feinauer said there needs to be more information-gathering and transparency.
The spill took place on Aug. 25, when an unoccupied semi-truck rolled into an open excavation at an Enbridge Line 5 valve project near Sitan Road outside Saxon in rural Iron County. The truck struck the pipeline, releasing natural gas liquids.
Reports of the incident spread quickly after drone footage shot by Joe Bates, an environmental activist and Bad River Band member, was posted online.
The incident occurred about 10 a.m., according to the Wisconsin DNR. Enbridge reported the discharge to the agency’s spill hotline roughly 1 hour and 15 minutes later. The company said it immediately isolated the affected pipe and shut down the line to prevent further releases.
Nearby homes were evacuated as a precaution, and local emergency crews and air-quality monitors responded. No injuries were reported.
Following the spill, Gov. Tony Evers and the Department of Natural Resources called on Enbridge to halt construction on the re-route of Line 5. Construction was halted for a number of days, but resumed this week.
As of Aug. 29, the company acknowledged that 31,000 barrels of propane and butane were vaporized into the atmosphere, and that 2,000 barrels of liquid were contained at the site. No further numbers have been provided by the company since then.
In a Sept. 3 update, the latest posted, Enbridge said testing of nearby surface water and a nearby residential well showed no impact. The posting said water monitoring wells have been installed near the site of the spill.
Enbridge said crews accessed this site and have injected compressed air into pools of remaining liquid to encourage evaporation, and that “flaring” has been used to “evacuate the remaining product from the impacted and isolated segment of Line 5.”
The company declined to answer further questions about how much liquid was spilled at the site, and to respond to claims this is the largest spill to take place in Wisconsin.
But advocates have pointed to previous spills, where it took months for Enbridge to release full information about the amount of products spilled from various pipelines, including a 2019 spill, resulting in 1,386 gallons of petroleum diluent leaking from Line 6 in Jefferson County and a 2024 spill resulting in 69,300 gallons of crude oil, also from Line 6 in Jefferson County.
Feinauer, in a Sept. 3 media release release, said pipelines like Line 5 pose to a greater environmental risk than Enbridge acknowledges.
“As Enbridge resorts to burning the remaining liquid natural gas it spilled, we are seeing in real time the risk our state bears so Enbridge can use our Northwoods as a pass through for its pipeline,” he said.
Several drilling fluid releases have occurred this summer
In addition to the natural gas liquid spill, there have been several releases of drilling fluids along the re-route of Line 5 taking place in northern Wisconsin.
Several so-called frac outs have occurred along the reroute since June, releasing pressurized drilling fluids as the company utilizes horizontal drilling, a method that runs pipelines under sensitive areas, like creeks and wetlands.
The first frac-out, which took place on June 27, released between five and eight gallons of bentonite clay slurry into Vaughn Creek, which flows through land owned by the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. The creek flows into the Potato River, and then eventually into the Bad River.
A spokesperson for Enbridge confirmed another frac out occurred Sept. 2 while the company drilled under the Potato River. There was a release of 100 gallons of clay and water at the site, and it was immediately cleaned up, said spokesperson Ryan Duffy.
Feinauer, in an interview, said that the number of issues that have arisen over the course of construction on Line 5 only illustrate how dangerous pipelines can be for the environment they pass through.
“What I hope it is that folks are seeing with some of these impacts, that there really is no 100% safe way to do this, and there are environmental costs to building these kinds of things, oil pipelines in particular,” he said. “People need to understand that this is what this can look like when people build these things through northern Wisconsin.”
Enbridge first proposed its 41-mile reroute around the Bad River Band’s land in 2019 after the Band sued to have the original Line 5 pipeline removed from its land. The new stretch of pipeline would go farther inland, to Ashland and Iron counties, through Iron County State Forest, around Copper Falls State Park. It will cross more than 180 Lake Superior tributaries, including the Bad River.
The company said the reroute is 65% complete at this point.
Laura Schulte can be reached at leschulte@jrn.com and on X @SchulteLaura.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Concerns rise over Line 5 after natural gas spill, multiple frac outs
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
