Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline: New Report Spotlights Incredible Threats

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In the wake of the State Departmentโ€™s announcement to delay the Keystone XL decision, another proposed tar sands pipeline is coming under closer scrutiny. The Northern Gateway Pipeline, proposed by Canadaโ€™s Enbridge Energy, would stretch nearly 750 miles across Alberta and British Columbia before reaching an inland port. (DeSmogBlog has been following the Northern Gateway Pipeline story inย detail.)

A report released today by the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Pembina Institute, and the Living Oceans Society documents the enormous risk โ€“ environmental, economic, and social โ€“ to communities and regions along the pipeline and tanker paths, specifically to valuable salmon-bearing rivers and coastal ecosystems, including the habitat of the endangered Spiritย Bear.ย 

The impacts anticipated by the โ€œPipeline and Tanker Troubleโ€ report include:

  • Compromising the lifestyles of First Nations who depend on the regionโ€™s lands and waters for their livelihoods, culture, andย health.
  • Threatening the economic well-being of thecommunities of British Columbia that depend on fisheries andย forests.
  • Potential devastation from a major oil spill from the pipeline or an oil supertanker, which could destroy economically important salmon habitat, as well as the habitat of Spirit Bears and grizzlies, and whales, orcas, and other marine life that depend on these rich coastalย waters.
  • Harm from an oil spill to the Great Bear Rainforest thatthe province and First Nations have worked hard toprotect from unsustainable forestry practices and to shift to a conservation-basedย economy.

Before getting into the details of the report, a quick bit of background. After tar sands are extracted from Albertaโ€™s Athabasca boreal region, the sticky, heavily viscous muck must be diluted, shipped, and refined to be of any use. Right now, major pipeline systems operated by companies like TransCanada and Enbridge cart a big share of the tar sands crude down to inland refineries in places like Cushing, Oklahoma and Patoka,ย Illinois.

According to their own literature, suppliers and refiners are desperate to connect the tar sands supply with coastal refineries where the DilBit can be refined into diesel, which fetches a higher price on the international market. In other words, coastal refineries are necessary for exporting the tar sands product, and exporting the tar sands product would be most profitable for the energyย companies.

This ultimate export goal was struck a major blow when, as weโ€™ve covered here on DeSmogBlog, a State Department decision on approval of the Keystone XL extension of TransCanadaโ€™s Keystone pipeline system was delayed. Keystone XL would have linked the tar sands supply with Valero refineries on the Gulf Coast of Texas, where the low grade diesel could then be shipped overseas to a booming international dieselย markets.

Which brings us to the proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline. The route’s risks come in two parts: the pipeline itself, and then the waterways that must be navigated by big supertankers to deliver the tar sands crude toย refineries.

As the report makes clear, the threats to the region and its residents along both the pipeline and waterway paths are very real, and quiteย serious.

First, the pipeline. If constructed, it would cross at least 785 rivers and streams, and the headwaters of three of the most important watersheds โ€“ the Mackenzie, the Fraser, and the Skeena โ€“ in North America, before reaching an inland port on the Kitimatย River.

(Click on the map for a larger PDFย version.)

Of the route, report co-author Susan Casey-Lefkowitz wrote, โ€œThe geology of this area is complex, and destructive landslides areย common.โ€

Tar sands pipelines seem to be more susceptible to ruptures and spills, and when DilBit does spill, the impacts are even worse than regular crudeย spills.

Just last year, an Enbridge tar sands pipeline ruptured in Marshall, Michigan, and even twelve months later the town was reeling from the impacts.

After the DilBit is delivered from the pipeline onto supertankers waiting on the Kitimat River, the route that these shipments must take is incredibly precarious. Casey-Lefkowitzย writes:

Once it reaches the coast, the tar sands would be transported by supertanker to refineries in Asia, California, or elsewhere. However, first the supertankers would traverse 185 kilometres of inner coastal waters, including the Douglas Channel, before reaching open ocean in the unpredictably dangerous Hecate Strait, Queen Charlotte Sound and Dixon Entrance. There is a reason that large oil supertankers have not used these waters in the past: the route poses many navigational challenges for large vessels, even under ideal conditions.

Echoing this point was Katie Terhune of the Living Oceans Society. โ€œHistory has shown that oil tankers come with oil spills,โ€ said Terhune. โ€œIt is not a question of if, but when, a spill willย happen.โ€

The report gets into even moreย detail:

The risk of an oil tanker spill is elevated along the B.C. coast because the unique topography and poor weather conditions make navigation difficult. The coastline is punctuated by narrow inlets and fjords, dotted with thousands of rocky outcroppings and islands, lined with underwater ledges and shoals, and rife with unmarked hazards. This coast is often battered by winter storms with gale to storm force winds, 10-metre waves, and freezing sea spray. Precipitation and fog often reduces visibility to less than three kilometres. The Hecate Straightโ€”a main body of water for the proposed tanker routeโ€”is considered the fourth most dangerous body of water in the world because of quickly changing winds and sea states. Marine vessel incidents along the coast are not uncommon. Between 1999 and 2009, there were 1,275 marine vessel incidents along Canadaโ€™s Pacific coast,including collisions, explosions, groundings, and sinkings. The narrow passages of the coast allow little room for error.

With Keystone XL‘s path to the Gulf Coast now on hold, pressure is mounting to find new coastal outlets for this tar sands crude. While the big oil companies stand to profit enormously from exporting diesel to booming overseas markets, the communities along the pipeline and tanker routes stand to assume all the risks. As this new report makes crystal clear, these risks are enormous, and practicallyย inevitable.

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Ben Jervey is a Senior Fellow for DeSmog and directs the KochvsClean.com project. He is a freelance writer, editor, and researcher, specializing in climate change and energy systems and policy. Ben is also a Research Fellow at the Institute for Energy and the Environment at Vermont Law School. He was the original Environment Editor for GOOD Magazine, and wrote a longstanding weekly column titled โ€œThe New Ideal: Building the clean energy economy of the 21st Century and avoiding the worst fates of climate change.โ€ He has also contributed regularly to National Geographic News, Grist, and OnEarth Magazine. He has published three booksโ€”on eco-friendly living in New York City, an Energy 101 primer, and, most recently, โ€œThe Electric Battery: Charging Forward to a Low Carbon Future.โ€ He graduated with a BA in Environmental Studies from Middlebury College, and earned a Masterโ€™s in Energy Regulation and Law at Vermont Law School. A bicycle enthusiast, Ben has ridden across the United States and through much ofย Europe.

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