Posted Draft EIS Comments

I think the initial proposal to bring line 5 into our Great Lakes, violate, indigenous treaties and allow presidential administrations to be able to oversee that is not fair to the tax paying constituents of this country.

Dear Army Corps of Engineers: please pause all approvals for the Line 5 tunnel under the Mackinac Straits until a full environmental review is completed—including assessments of climate impacts, Indigenous rights, and public health. My only 2 grandchildren are , as I type, with beloved family up in Cheboygan kicking off their summer vacation in the cabin that has been part of the other grandma’s family for years and years. I wish you could have seen how excited they were about going up north; a magical place that remains pristine and beautiful, a paradise of memories waiting to be made. As an ardent water protector and loving grandmother, I ask you to carefully consider the upcoming project…for my grandkids and yours and for 7 generations beyond them.
Sincerely and with much gratitude for your wisdom, vision and heart,
Renee Baumunk
Ypsilanti Grandmother and loving citizen of the Great Lake State of Michigan.

I am writing to discuss my concern as it relates to the consideration for the Line 5 Project. Our home is the last residence on Headlands Rd, without affiliation to Enbridge. They have purchased all other residence’s in that direct area. Line 5 currently runs directly behind our home. We are concerned with what this pending project will mean for us directly, including noise, vibration, inconveniences of all equipment needing to travel past our home, the geological changes that will occur and impact to our water table, while the project is ongoing for a number of years. I know Enbridge is aware that this will be an absolutely intolerable situation for us. They in fact sent someone to our home to request if we would have an interest to sell. Although this has been our planned forever home and has been for 30 years, we were now faced with project interfering with many years of our life. We decided we likely would need to leave – as the Enbridge Land Acquisition employee expressed – Enbridge was trying to be a good neighbor and recognizes the inconvenience. They didn’t offer a price, but asked us to give a price we would request, which we did do. It was hard to put a price in changing our life plan. We are the longest living residents on Headlands Rd. Our children were raised there and now our grandchildren have to come to appreciate our slice of heaven surrounded by the woods and the Dark Sky Park.
There will be environmental impacts and we would prefer not to have to watch what happens if the tunnel is approved in such an up close and personal manner. Enbridge has never responded to our offer, other than the initial reaction to say that it was a “hard no”. The inability for Enbridge to even extend a discussion on what they feel is is a reasonable offer is incomprehensible to me. They have no idea of what our life plans were. There is no place to live in our area that mimics our slice of heaven that will likely soon become a construction project for years to come. For this reason I think there should be alternative explorations of the movement of the oil that decreases the impact on the Straits and allows us to stay right where we are without the upheaval for several years. Until Enbridge really does try to be a good neighbor to our family, we are a hard no to this project moving forward.

I do not support the project moving forward due to environmental concerns.

I have many concerns regarding this project, most of which deal with an apparent lack of geological assessment of the area. Many people on both sides of the straits have home wells for their water and several communities also use those aquifers for their water systems. I’ve seen no evidence that the aquifers that feed those wells have been assessed and mapped. Without that information, how can anyone develop a mitigation plan?? Also, there has never been a thorough geological assessment of the proposed path of the tunnel. Wouldn’t it be advisable to do this before the tunnel work gets approved? Since this oil and gas just travels through Michigan only to return to Canada, why should we risk our entire fresh water system of lakes? Enbridge has a terrible safety and response record. They’ve had multiple spills in the Upper and Lower Peninsulas. It took them days to notice and weeks to ‘mitigate’ (ultimately ineffectively) their huge spill into the Kalamazoo River…..and that river is still polluted to this very day. This might be a very good time to CLOSE the Michigan route entirely and have Enbridge re-rebuild the line in their own country? Given the heating of our planet, our country might need these fresh waters to mitigate regional water shortages, but if there are problems, leaks, et cetera, the water would be poisoned and useless. I realize the present Administration in D.C. has been pushing energy related projects (especially of fossil fuels), but this project is just a pass-through, with no direct benefit to our state.

I am just a citizen of Michigan who respects and appreciates our Great Lakes. What a resource we have here! Bountiful fresh water for drinking, swimming, and for transportation should not be endangered by an unnecessary pipeline or tunnel. Alternative sources of energy are available for the UP. And, here in the LP, only 5% of the oil that is transported through that pipeline is used in Michigan. That 5% can be obtained through another source without impacting the price of gasoline to Michiganders by more than a few cents per gallon. The impact of a spill would be devastating to Michigan and to the US as a whole. Freight traffic through the Straits would be stopped. Out beautiful lakes would be oiled and the smell would keep tourists away from Mackinac Island, where I work. My job would be no more, as the jobs for my coworkers and for most everyone else on the Island. I can’t list all of the impacts. The tunnel and pipeline are not needed and the impact of a spill would be catastrophic. That’s all I can say. Please stop the tunnel.

To Whom It May Concern,

I urge you to pause approvals of the Line 5 Tunnel project until a full environmental review is completed.

The project poses substantial hazards for the Great Lakes region. However, it has not undergone a comprehensive risk assessment, so there is no way to know just how likely it is to harm our communities. One such hazard is the potential for oil spills in the Great Lakes (which would contaminate our drinking water and shorelands). The project will also lock us into greater dependence on fossil fuels for our energy. We are already seeing catastrophic impacts of climate change in Michigan (ice storms, flooding, and heatwaves, for example,) and the continued burning of fossil fuels will only exacerbate these effects. A full environmental review would include an assessment of these climate risks. As no such review has been completed, the project should not go forward.

The “energy emergency” is an insufficient justification for fast-tracking this process. The federal government has taken actions to shut down renewable energy projects–actions that would run counter to an imperative to expand domestic energy production. Even were the “emergency” real, it should not override concerns about public safety and environmental well-being. Cheap power is not worth unsafe drinking water.

Thank you for the consideration of my message.
Sincerely,
Leah Johnson, PhD

Let’s approve tunnel.

I’m against the pipeline and the tunnel crossing the Strait. There are other, existing pipelines that run through Wisconsin and Illinois on land, that don’t put our Great Lakes at risk. Close it down now. Redirect the oil and gas to the other existing pipelines. Our fresh water is too precious and rare to continue this risk. I’ve lived in Michigan my entire life and treasure our fresh water. I don’t understand how this can even be a question. Protect our fresh water.