Fate of Sandpiper Pipeline in Limbo After Enbridge-Marathon Move
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The future is unclear for a proposed oil pipeline that would cross northern Minnesota.
Enbridge Energy on Tuesday announced it is investing in a different pipeline that would transport North Dakota crude oil — but not across Minnesota.
The Canadian company has proposed the $2.6 billion Sandpiper pipeline that would run from the Bakken oil fields through Minnesota to a terminal in Superior, Wisconsin.
Enbridge, based in Calgary, Alberta, and Houston-based Marathon Petroleum, a key partner in Sandpiper, are forming a joint venture to buy a stake in the Bakken Pipeline project, which would transport oil from North Dakota across the Midwest to Texas.
Once the new Bakken pipeline deal is complete, the company will “evaluate the scope and timing” of Sandpiper, Enbridge said in a statement.
In February, Enbridge said it expected to push back the startup date for Sandpiper to 2019. The pipeline proposal is going through the Minnesota regulatory process.
Environmentalists contend Sandpiper would threaten ecologically sensitive areas.
With Enbridge’s new pipeline investment, Sandpiper “will be put on the shelf,” Scott Strand, head of the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, told the Star Tribune. Strand’s group had pushed for a full environmental review of Sandpiper.
Late last year the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission ordered a full environmental impact review of Sandpiper. Enbridge has said the state’s regulatory process is delaying Sandpiper and another project, a replacement pipeline to carry Canadian crude oil across northern Minnesota.
“My guess, and it’s just a guess at this point, is that Sandpiper is not built in the near term while they take a stake in this (Bakken) pipeline,” Steven Paget, an analyst with First Energy Capital in Calgary, told Minnesota Public Radio News.
Environmental groups and American Indian tribes have opposed both Enbridge pipelines in Minnesota, saying if they break they would pollute wild-rice lakes and the Mississippi River headwaters.
Related News
Related News
- Keystone Oil Pipeline Resumes Operations After Temporary Shutdown
- Freeport LNG Plant Runs Near Zero Consumption for Fifth Day
- Biden Administration Buys Oil for Emergency Reserve Above Target Price
- Mexico Seizes Air Liquide's Hydrogen Plant at Pemex Refinery
- Enbridge to Invest $500 Million in Pipeline Assets, Including Expansion of 850-Mile Gray Oak Pipeline
- Enbridge Receives Approval to Begin Service on Louisiana Venice Gas Pipeline Project
- U.S. to Acquire 3 Million Barrels of Oil for Emergency Reserve in September
- AG&P LNG Acquires 49% Stake in Vietnam's Cai Mep LNG Terminal
- BP's Carbon Emissions Increase in 2023, Ending Decline Since 2019
- Texas Sues EPA Over Methane Emission Rules for Oil and Gas Sector
Comments