A federal judge has ruled that energy company Enbridge must soon shut down its pipeline, which was found to be trespassing on a Native American reservation.
U.S. District Judge William Conley ordered that Enbridge adopt a new plan for its Line 5 pipeline within 21 days and redevelop a new route within the next three years that avoids the current 12-mile route that crosses into the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa's reservation in Wisconsin.
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Judge Conley additionally ordered the company to pay the tribe a fee of $5.1 million for trespassing onto the tribe's protected lands.
Bad River Band filed the lawsuit in 2019 in an attempt to shut down the pipeline immediately, arguing it posed a risk in the event it ruptured. In 2020, a section of the same pipeline had a "damaged anchor support" that temporarily closed the pipeline.
"Enbridge agrees with the Court’s decision to reject the Band’s argument that Line 5 must immediately shut down; however, the company disagrees with several aspects of the Court’s orders, including that Enbridge is in trespass, and that Line 5 must cease operations on the Bad River Reservation within three years," a company spokesperson told the Washington Examiner.
"Enbridge’s position has long been that in a 1992 contract between Enbridge and the Band, the Band consented to operations of Line 5 on the Reservation through 2043. Enbridge plans to appeal the Court’s decision."
The company instead proposed the creation of a new segment in Ashland and Iron counties intended to avoid the reservation, measuring 41 miles around, and a price tag of $450 million. It has yet to receive the necessary state permits but would take one year to build, per the spokesperson.
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Line 5 transports 540,000 gallons of fuel per day from Canada to the Great Lakes region. The same amount would require the equivalent of 2,000 trucks to transport.
Bad River Band Chairman Mike Wiggins Jr. could not be reached for comment at the time of publishing.