LANSING — Michigan state agencies have released for public comment a draft independent analysis of the impacts of a potential oil spill from Enbridge Line 5 in the Straits of Mackinac.
A team led by Michigan Technological University and directed by professor Guy Meadows of Michigan Tech’s Great Lakes Research Center submitted the draft report “Independent Risk Analysis for the Straits Pipelines” to state officials on July 16.
“Line 5 cannot remain in the Straits in its current form,” said Michigan Department of Natural Resources Director and Pipeline Safety Advisory Board co-chair Keith Creagh. “This report highlights the need to continue developing a decommissioning strategy that protects the Great Lakes while at the same time maintaining the critical infrastructure between Michigan’s peninsulas that makes us one state.”
The worst-case approach implemented in the study is based on the accumulation of worst-case assumptions and explicitly excludes consideration of the probability of such events. As a result, the assessment extends to events with low probabilities of occurrence but high consequences.
According to the analysis of more than 4,300 spill simulations, a rupture to both Straits pipelines with concurrent failures of primary valves on each pipeline and secondary safety valves, could release 32,000 to 58,000 barrels of crude oil into the Great Lakes and impact more than 400 miles of shoreline in Michigan, Wisconsin and Canada based on wind and current conditions. Depending on the timing and magnitude of a spill, 47 wildlife species of concern and 60,000 acres of unique habitat could be at risk.
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