FILE - An above ground section of Enbridge's Line 5 at the Mackinaw City, Mich., pump station sits on Oct. 7, 2016.

By LISA BOWERS

Journal City Editor

LANSING — Republicans in the Michigan Senate want to speed up the construction of the Line 5 tunnel under the Straits of Mackinac by appealing to federal and state permitting agencies and other officials.

All 18 members of the Senate Republican caucus, including Sen. Ed McBroom, R-Waucedah, Township, sent a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Wednesday urging them to expedite the state and federal permitting processes necessary for the construction of the Great Lakes Tunnel Project for Line 5 under the Straits of Mackinac. The letter says the move will “ensure energy affordability and stability in the state.”

“The unreasonable delay in the permitting process and construction of the Great Lakes tunnel is a tremendous disservice to the people of Michigan and the entire region,” McBroom said in a press release. “Stop stalling. The tunnel project was approved almost five years ago with bipartisan support to protect our Great Lakes and create thousands of good-paying, mainly union jobs in our state while also ensuring families continue to receive the propane they need to heat their homes and communities get the fuel needed to power our economy — yet we still have nothing to show for it due to government inaction.”

According to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, 23,000 households in the Upper Peninsula. heat their homes with propane.

The letter was sent to Gov. Whitmer and Lt. Gen. Scott A. Spellmon, chief of engineers and commanding general of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It urged the corps to end its permitting delays and urged Whitmer to direct her state agencies and the Michigan Public Service Commission to expedite their permitting processes so workers can begin construction.

The letter said, “In Michigan, Line 5 provides jobs to over 6,000 hard-working residents and over $464 million in labor income. Tens of thousands of jobs are dependent upon Line 5 in downstream industries such as refineries, manufacturers, airports and businesses that rely upon all the energy products coming from the line.”

The caucus’ letter asserts that the Michigan Public Service Commission has failed to take up the issue for months, even though Enbridge returned its requested information nearly six months ago.

During a Wednesday phone call, a MPSC spokesman told The Mining Journal that while no order has been issued in the case — which requests siting approval to replace and relocate the Line 5 pipeline segment that currently crosses the Straits of Mackinac into a tunnel that would be constructed under the lakebed — the matter is still under commission consideration.

In an emailed statement, the MPSC said:

“Enbridge’s application is a complex matter, and the commission has taken a number of steps since the case was filed, including addressing the scope of the issues to be considered in April 2021, and reopening the record in July 2022 to gather additional evidence on engineering and safety matters critical to the proposed project. A case this significant deserves robust deliberation, and the commission will issue its order in due course.”

The project has faced several lawsuits and mixed public feedback in addition to the complex MPSC case.

The Detroit News reported that Whitmer negotiated with Enbridge in 2019 to try to get the Canadian pipeline giant to shorten its tunnel completion time frame to two years. When those negotiations failed, Attorney General Dana Nessel and Whitmer filed suit seeking to close the pipeline. Enbridge filed suit to keep it open.

Opponents are concerned about the impact the continued use of the pipeline, even if it’s buried in a tunnel under the lakebed, will have on state waterways.

According to the Sierra Club, a grassroots environmental organization, two major lawsuits that seek to force Enbridge to shut down the 70-year-old pipeline filed by Nessel and the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa by revoking the state and tribal easements for the pipeline are under review in federal appeals courts as of Friday.

McBroom’s press release also noted that construction on the project, which he called critical, was originally scheduled to begin in 2021, with tunnel operation to begin in 2024. That’s been set back several years.

Tunnel construction requires permits under the federal Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899 as well as the Clean Water Act. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for deciding whether Enbridge’s application can get through under those laws.

The Army Corps indicated a decision on permitting should not be expected until 2026.

The Corps announced in March that it expects to take an additional 18 months to review the Enbridge permit application for the Line 5 tunnel, according to a Detroit News article.

The Corps opened its initial public comment period for the scope of the project from August 2022 through October 2022. More than 17,000 comments were received.

If the permit is approved in 2026, the tunnel would not be operational until at least 2030 because Enbridge officials say it will take four years to build the structure.

“We should be having a ribbon-cutting by now, and instead we are not even going to consider breaking ground until 2026,” McBroom said. “Michigan residents deserve better. They deserve affordable and reliable energy. State and federal agencies need to get their act together and work on getting this critical infrastructure project underway.”

Line 5 is part of Enbridge’s Lakehead system. It starts in Superior, Wisconsin, and ends in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada.

According to the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy’s web page, the proposed Line 5 tunnel is a public-private partnership between Enbridge and the Mackinac Bridge Authority to fund the project negotiated in 2018, which was estimated to cost $500 million at that time.

In December 2018, Gov. Rick Snyder signed legislation to create the Mackinac Straits Corridor Authority and its board voted to approve an agreement with Enbridge.

Lisa Bowers can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 570. Her email address is lbowers@miningjournal.net.