Posted Draft EIS Comments

You know there is no energy emergency. In fact, Line 5 serves no necessary public purpose, as PLG has demonstrated conclusively:
https://plgconsulting.com/white-paper-likely-market-responses-to-a-line-5-shutdown
You must therefore earn the trust of the Indigenous peoples who withdraw from this process, as well as the American public. You must deny the permit. Do not cave in to pressure from and on behalf of the notoriously abusive foreign company Enbridge. Stand up for what is right, for the country and the world.

Stop Line 5

I am a grandmother, so the quality of the future is very important to me, even though I will not be here. Already this summer, I have endured smoke from wildfires and record heat, both results of climate change caused by burning fossil fuels.
Why then are we poised to spend more monies on infrastructure that keeps the fossil fuel energy system going (oil pipes under the Great Lakes---Line 5?) What resources we have need to go into renewable energy that will not pollute the air and water.

June 30, 2025
Line 5 Tunnel EIS
16501 Shady Grove Road
PO Box 10178, Gaithersburg MD 20898

Ref: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Project LRE-2010-00463-56-A19
The organizations and individuals listed below call on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) to abandon its fundamentally flawed and inadequate Draft Environmental Impact Statement for Enbridge's Line 5 oil tunnel proposal and to deny the permit sought by Enbridge. Through a deliberate pattern of exclusions and omissions, USACE has orchestrated a sham review process that appears designed to rubber-stamp approval for a project that poses catastrophic risks to the Great Lakes. This represents not merely procedural failure, but an unconscionable betrayal of the agency's legal obligations to the public.

USACE's Draft EIS is a mockery of environmental review, systematically ignoring critical construction risks and project impacts that any competent analysis would address. The agency has turned a blind eye to Enbridge's project modifications and the company's calculated efforts to circumvent full state analysis, allowing fundamental design elements, environmental consequences, and construction protocols to escape proper scrutiny under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and other applicable laws.

This rigged process ensures that no federal agency will fulfill its legal duty to thoroughly examine the severe risks and impacts of this project or the viable alternatives to threading oil infrastructure through one of the world's most precious freshwater ecosystems. USACE has abdicated its responsibility to conduct genuine environmental review, instead providing cover for a project that should never be permitted. The agency must start over with an honest, comprehensive analysis—or reject this dangerous proposal outright.
Allowing an oil tunnel to be built in the Straits of Mackinac would be an unprecedented experiment that endangers the Great Lakes, one of the most sensitive ecosystems in the world. USACE has failed to fully consider all of the following issues as part of its duty under NEPA to protect our natural resources for the public good and benefit.

I. USACE narrowed alternatives analysis fails to include analysis of reasonable alternative methods and locations for transport of oil currently routed through Line 5.

II. Indirect, cumulative, and connected impacts of this project, including climate impacts and related projects along the path of Line 5 were not fully considered, resulting in segmentation of the analysis.

III. USACE failed to thoroughly review the complex geological and hydrogeological conditions in the Straits of Mackinac and require Enbridge to remedy the inadequacy of existing geotechnical studies.

V. USACE failed to thoroughly evaluate the risk of explosion both during construction and during operation once construction is completed.

VI. USACE’s signaled approval fails to consider the full history of environmental and safety violations committed by Enbridge as it considers potential environmental impacts of the project.

Conclusion: USACE Must Reject This Dangerous and Unneeded Proposal

The Great Lakes are not a testing ground for corporate experiments. Enbridge’s proposal is a reckless gamble with 20% of the planet’s freshwater, and USACE’s truncated review greenlights it without the honest scrutiny required. There is no ‘energy emergency’ justifying this risk, but we do face a climate emergency that demands an end to expansions to dangerous fossil fuel infrastructure, like Line 5. USACE must:
• Reject the current EIS as legally and scientifically indefensible.
• Expand the review to fully analyze alternatives, climate impacts, and risks during construction and operation.
• Honor and protect Tribal Treaty rights, avoid the destruction of cultural resources including resting relatives, and avoid the desecration of an Anishinaabe sacred space by rejecting the Line 5 Tunnel Project.

The stakes could not be higher. If USACE refuses to act, it will be complicit in the potential destruction of the Great Lakes and the communities that depend on them.

Michigan Microplastic Coalition

Art Hirsch
Michigan Microplastics Coalition

I oppose line 5 tunnel and desire that the existing pipeline be closed, and ALL efforts are for fossil free energy and reduced energy consumption in general

PIPES.FAIL! Enbridge has a horrible record of oil spills. The future needs to get away from fossil fuels. An oil spill would be disastrous for the Great Lakes. Michigan has NOTHING to gain from Line 5 and has a LOT to lose. Be smart and deny Line 5 access to our Great Lakes.

We are currently in a climate crisis that requires immediate and preventative actions to sustain life as we know it. Protecting our water should be priority #1! There is no Planet B. No more drilling for oil and risking our precious water sources.

We don't need this. We need green energy. The possible environmental impacts to our fresh water, wildlife, soil is monumental.

Good Morning, In lieu of denying the permit (preferred action) for Line 5 New Route around the. Bad River Reservation (but still located in the ceded territory, please extend the comment period. I live in Bayfield County, north of the expected new routing. I am extremely concerned and saddened by a new route. The potential impact to soil, quality of life, wells, cultural resources (wild rice and ash trees), and especially to the waters, will be devastating. I have watched what has occurred in Minnesota, along the Line 3 build. The impact continues to reveal itself. There is no amount of restoration or mitigation to affected geology that would ever recreate the original conditions. Fractures and leaks are part of the build process. Enbridge is not known for its honesty nor for the quality of its work. Please pay close attention to the expert witnesses who testified for Bad River during the contested case hearing. They brought the deep dive and quality of assessment - and knowledge of on-the-ground conditions that is embarrassingly and sorely missing from the information - written by Enbridge - that you see in their various permit applications for ACE and for the WIDNR. Please either deny this permit, or extend the comment period. Thank you.