Lake Superior Chippewa, Rob Lee, Midwest Environmental Advocates Staff Attorney, Evan Fineour,
Clean Wisconsin Staff Attorney, Elizabeth Ward, Executive Director of the Sierra Club Wisconsin
Chapter, Deborah Cronmiller, Executive Director of the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin,
and Emily Park, Co-Executive Director of 350 Wisconsin.
We are here today to announce a number of separate legal actions, challenging permits,
and other regulatory approvals for Enbridge Energy's controversial plan to build a new
41-mile segment of its Line 5 oil pipeline near the Bad River Reservation in Northern Wisconsin.
Today, the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa filed two legal challenges,
the first as a lawsuit against Wisconsin DNR for failing to conduct a thorough
environmental analysis of the project, the second as an appeal, contesting the permit,
and its conditions. I will note here that the band is represented by Earth Justice,
and we'll hear more about their legal challenge in a few minutes.
A separate legal action was filed today by Clean Wisconsin and Midwestern environmental advocates.
MEA represents Sierra Club, the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, and 350 Wisconsin in that
action. All of the groups represented here today are united in opposition to the proposed
construction of a new segment of Enbridge Line 5 and the harm the project would cause.
Before I turn the mic over to our first speaker today, I should note that there will be a question
and answer period at the end of the press conference, so I invite members of the media to submit
comments through the question and answer feature or through the chat. With that, I will
invite our first speaker, Chairman Robert Blanchard of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa
to go ahead and unmute yourself and go ahead and speak. Thank you.
Good afternoon, and thank you for having me this afternoon. My name is Robert Blanchard.
I'm Chairman of Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa unions. We are located in Northern Wisconsin
along Lake Superior, and I'm here today to hopefully answer any questions that you may have,
and also if they are referencing any legal questions, I will refer that to the attorney,
Stephanie, and try to get you the information that we can best provide.
But as you know, Enbridge was granted the permits from the state BNR to reroute their pipeline from
the lands that it goes through Bad River right now, and to go along the reservation
southward and then across again, which puts it in a lot of the watershed that feeds our streams
in our rivers and our lake, and if something was to happen during that time or when that
pipeline's in place, you know, it's really going to affect a lot of the things that we do here,
and the way we do things here on the reservation as far as our way of life.
We do have annual harvest of our wild rice, which grows along the rivers here in Bad River and
Lake Superior, and we hunt, we fish, and we gather a lot of our medicines that we use to heal
ourselves here, and if they are, something happens to them, you know, our people are going to feel that,
we have a lot at stake here.
Thank you, Chairman Blantern. Our next speaker is attorney Rob Lee with Midwest Environmental Advocates.
Thank you, Peg, and thank you, Chairman Blanchard. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Rob Lee,
and I am the staff attorney at Midwest Environmental Advocates.
MEA is a Wisconsin-based nonprofit environmental law center that provides legal services and
support to communities working to protect their rights to a clean and healthy environment.
Earlier this morning, MEA joined Clean Wisconsin as mentioned in filing a petition for a contested
case hearing, challenging regulatory approvals issued by Wisconsin DNR for Enbridge Energy's
plan to build a new 41-mile segment of its line 5 oil pipeline near the Bad River
reservation in northern Wisconsin. Today, we stand in solidarity with Bad River Band of
Lake Superior Chippewa to support them and their efforts to stop this dangerous and destructive
pipeline construction project. I do want to emphasize that the legal action, the MEA and
Clean Wisconsin filed is separate from the legal actions filed by Earth Justice on behalf of
Bad River Band. Our petition, at least for MEA's part, was filed on behalf of Sierra Club
League of Women Voters of Wisconsin and 350 Wisconsin and submitted jointly with the Wisconsin
with whom we've been working closely. Together, we're challenging DNR's decision to issue a wetland
fill and waterway crossing permit for this reroute and DNR's decision to convey coverage under the
department's general permit for construction site storm water runoff. In addition, we're also
challenging a determination that this project will meet the state of Wisconsin's water quality
standards. The first point I want to make is, in our view, Enbridge isn't even eligible for all
the permits it is applied for, and particularly the authorization to place permanent and temporary
structures on the beds of waterways. Enbridge must own the properties on either side of those
waterway crossings and the easements they've obtained are simply not good enough under Wisconsin law.
As far as the actual impacts from the reroute, the construction project that's been proposed,
our petition alleges that Enbridge did not provide and that DNR did not have enough information in
the permit application to lawfully issue permits for this project. One good example of that is Enbridge
has not identified exactly which waterway crossings would require blasting through that
waterways bedrock. Nor did they provide basic site specific information about topography, hydrology,
and geology of those potential blasting sites. And we also allege that Enbridge's construction
plan and plan to restore the impacts from construction consistently understate not only the
environmental damage from the project itself, but also overstates Enbridge's ability to repair
that damage. So one example we point to in our petition is the way that the harmful impacts
associating with clearing forested wetlands have been mischaracterized by Enbridge. It's temporary
when in fact it's likely going to take multiple decades to restore pre-construction conditions
in those wetlands. Moreover, those impacts will not be to wetlands will not be confined to the
construction right of way, but will reach far beyond that given the extent of the construction
activities and the interconnected nature of the wetland complexes that we route would cross.
I could go on and provide additional examples from our filing, but there's certainly
too numerous to mention here, and I would just refer you to that filing. It does speak for itself.
So in some, given the risks associated with the project of this scale and the potential of
significant environmental harm, we believe Enbridge should not be allowed to move forward with the
reroute as permitted. I'll now turn it over to my colleague, Clean Wisconsin Attorneys Evan Fine
Hour. Yeah, thanks. Good afternoon, everyone. So I'm Evan Fine Hour, staff attorney with Clean
Wisconsin. Clean Wisconsin is a statewide membership organization that's spent around for 50 years.
Big part of what we do on behalf of our members is fight to protect water resources across the
state. And particularly relevant today's topic is wetlands. And I just
robbed it a really good job of talking about the overarching themes in the case, but I want to
emphasize the sort of important nature of wetlands in this for a couple of reasons. One is these
are really special places. And you know, when we get older, we kind of lose the ability sometimes
to be amazed by things. And the more I learn about wetlands, the more amazed I am and the more
I realize I don't know about them. And when I talk to experts, I get so enlightened and I learn so
much about how complicated nature is and how amazing what it creates is. And then you juxtapose that
with sometimes the hubris that people have that they think we can come and stomp through these
places and try to put them back together again. You combine that with how valuable wetlands are
for everything that we do, water quality, addressing flooding, Friday habitat for critical plants
animals. I mean, you name it. It's really a recipe for disaster to be going into these places without
a good plan. And that's why we have strong state laws that protect these places. But those laws
are really just words on paper. If we're not going to implement them to the fullest and consistently,
you know, no matter who you are and if you show up and you apply for a permit, you got to meet the
standards. And we've taken a really close look. And this doesn't meet the standards. These permits
shouldn't have been issued. And, you know, it's just, it's not acceptable to impact these places for
all the reasons I just said. And that's why groups like ours exist, like Lewis Johnson's exists,
to implement the law and make sure it's enforced correctly. And that's what we see ourselves doing
here today. And I also want to make sure, you know, before I pass it on again, just to thank
everybody that's been involved. This has been a long process. This has been proposed for a long
time. And there's been so many people, so many people around the state individuals and organizations
that have done something to help. And I just would be remiss if I didn't emphasize how grateful
clean Wisconsin is. And I'm sure everybody is about people standing up for what they think is right.
I do see a question about the process for contested case hearing. If it's appropriate,
I can go ahead and try to cover that now. Or I could hold it towards the end, whatever we'd
prefer. Let's go ahead and hold that until the end. Okay. Great. Thank you, Evan. We'll go now to
Elizabeth Ward. Thanks, Peg. And I echo Evans. Thanks to everyone here and around the state
who's done so much great work. My name is Elizabeth Ward. I'm the director of the statewide branch
of the Sierra Club. Sierra Club is a national grassroots organization committed to amplifying
the power of our members and supporters to defend their rights to healthy environment and to ensure
a safe livable future for generations to come. We're participating in this legal challenge and
are thankful to me for representing us because the line five reroute will endanger Wisconsin's
irreplaceable water resources, promote continued reliance on fossil fuels, and entrench
fossil fuel infrastructure in northern Wisconsin for generations to come. One of the most irreplaceable
resources that would be put at risk by line five construction is the CACAGAN SLUZ, a wetland
complex of global significance. Many people refer to the SLUZ as the Everglades of the north. They
are the only extensive coastal wild rice bed in the Great Lakes region, and they are critical to
maintaining genetic diversity of wild rice and Lake Superior. Like all wetlands, the CACAGAN SLUZ
are extremely sensitive to construction and other human impacts. The construction activities
proposed by Enbridge, including horizontal directional drilling, blasting dewatering and others, have
the potential to significantly compromise the ability of the wetlands to provide critical
ecosystem services such as flood protection, water filtration, and fish and wildlife habitat.
Similarly, Enbridge's construction plans have the potential to do significant harm to the
waterways that would be crossed by the reroute, as well as the underlying groundwater. Drilling
beneath waterways, which Enbridge proposes to do, can be dangerous. Aquifers can be breached and
drilling fluid can leak into the groundwater. Just look at what happened in Minnesota. While
constructing the line three replacement project in 2021, Enbridge punctured three aquifers
threatening three counties in Minnesota. The breach caused nearly 300 million gallons of groundwater
to flow to the surface level and release harmful drilling fluids. These aquifer breaches were
caused by a construction method known as horizontal directional drilling. Frackouts and aquifer
breaches are well known and predictable consequences of horizontal directional drilling. Enbridge
plans use these same methods in Wisconsin. Why should we expect a different result? The answer
is we shouldn't. That's why we're here today. On behalf of our 18,000 members across Wisconsin,
the Sierra Club looks forward to working with our partners to ensure that Enbridge is never
again allowed to show the kind of disregard for environmental regulations as they did during
the line three construction in Minnesota. Thank you.
Thank you, Elizabeth. Our next speaker is Deborah Cronmiller. Go ahead and unmute yourself, Deborah.
Thank you. Thank you, Peg. And thanks to all our partners and to MEA for representing us in
this critically important case. I am Deborah Cronmiller. I am the executive director for the
League of Women Voters of Wisconsin. We are a nonpartisan organization that encourages informed
and active participation in government. We work to increase understanding of major public policy
issues, and we influence public policy through education and advocacy. As an organization,
the League has long been at the forefront of efforts to protect our environment.
Our priorities include preventing water pollution, dramatically lowering greenhouse gas emissions,
and advancing renewable energy. The League also supports tribal sovereignty and treaty rights,
and recognizes the traditional and unique relationships the Bad River Band and other tribes have to
waters and aquatic beings in Wisconsin, generally, and in northern Wisconsin, specifically.
Our organization has strong interest in protecting the unique, remote, and ecologically sensitive
terrain of northern Wisconsin, where the line five reroute is proposed. We believe the Wisconsin
DNR has issued permits without all the information necessary to ensure that the harmful impacts
of this reroute have been fully considered. The line five construction will cause significant
harm to the wetlands, streams, and water bodies along the reroute, as well as the flora and fauna
that depend on them. The harm caused by the pipeline construction will be exacerbated
by extreme weather events like floods that are intensifying and becoming more common.
We believe that any proposal for a new pipeline has the burden of demonstrating that it can be
done in a way that truly minimizes harm to the sensitive lands and waters in and around the
Great Lakes. Enbridge has not met this burden. For years, Enbridge has been illegally trespassing
on the sacred land of the Bad River Band. It is time to stand up against this corporate giant
and do what is right for our land, our people, and our world. What we do now will impact all our
futures. Each of us has a voice in our own destiny. We are here today to stand up to those who are
enriched by the very fossil fields that in parallel our world, and we will remain steadfast in our
efforts to protect Wisconsin's environment and people.
Thank you so much, Deborah. Our final speaker today is Emily Park of 350, Wisconsin.
Hi, everybody, and thank you so much for being here today. My name is Emily Park, and I am
co-executive director with 350, Wisconsin. 350, Wisconsin is a nonprofit organization that
mobilizes grassroots power to change laws and policies to make transformational progress
towards environmental justice and solving the climate crisis by 2030. We work with tribes,
landowners, environmental advocates, and others to prevent the construction of new oil pipeline
infrastructure like the Line 5 reroute because of the devastating environmental and community
impacts associated with pipeline construction and operation. In addition to our concerns about
how the construction project will endanger our wetlands and waterways, we are deeply concerned
that the continued reliance on fossil fuels like those transported through Enbridge's Line 5
prevents a timely and just transition away from fossil fuels and exacerbates environmental
degradation driven by climate change. The climate crisis also threats everything that
Wisconsinites hold close in our hearts. Rising water temperatures, increased precipitation,
droughts, and flash floods, and other well-studied and documented climate change trends
threaten communities, water resources, agriculture, and public recreation throughout Wisconsin.
The lakes, rivers, and wetlands throughout our state are important to all Wisconsinites,
and the effects of climate change imperil our public trust rights to navigation,
creation, and critical natural and cultural resources, and our rights and the functional
benefits that these ecosystems provide, including carbon sequestration and water food duration.
So, as a challenge, the fact that the reroute
silicates and continues to be useful fuels, it would contribute to negative impacts
associated with fossil fuel production, transport, and consumption. And yet, somehow,
the TNR determined that the impacts would not be significant and that the project should move
forward regardless of the human and ecological damage it would cause. As we indicate in the
petition, we strongly agree with this disagree with this colloquial conclusion, and we will continue
to do everything we can to see that the Line 5 reroute does not move forward. Thank you.
Thank you, Emily. At this time, we're happy to open it up for questions.
So, I invite you to submit a question if you have one through the Q&A feature or through the chat.
We've already had a few questions come in. Let's go back to that question that came up
earlier around next steps. So, I'm going to put this one to you, Rob. Can you explain more about
what a contested case hearing is and what it involves?
Yeah, and I'll invite Evan to back feel anything that I miss here, but essentially,
a contested case hearing is an administrative hearing, and it's very much like what you
is similar to what you may think of a trial, right, where you have to introduce evidence,
including expert testimony and develop a record, and then submit that to administrative law
judge that will preside over that hearing, and they will decide the issues anew to see whether or
not DNR got it right. It is a little bit of an intense process, especially given the timeline.
It may be as soon as the spring, but at the end of that process, depending on what the
administrative law judge decides, then DNR will have the option to either accept that decision
or appeal it itself if it's unfavorable to DNR, and that same right would be afforded to us,
depending on that situation. But the very first thing that needs to happen right now is now
that DNR has received our petition, it must go through it and decide the issues that it will
grant for that hearing. For our part, we have 16 different issues in Earth Justice and the band
have led even more. Evan, I invite you to add any more if you'd like to that.
No, I think that was pretty good. I think that was the right level of detail and information there.
The statute does specify the timeline. That's kind of the target for this to work.
So the department's supposed to take, I think, 30 days here to decide what to do. And then after
that, we'll know more about what the timeline will look like. So as of right now, that's the next
step, and wouldn't want to speculate much beyond that about how long things you're going to take
or when exactly things will happen. So that would be the next shoe to drop, so to speak.
I'd also say, too, catastrophe hearing does typically include a public testimony component.
So there is a public access aspect of this whenever that hearing is ultimately scheduled.
The only other pertinent thing to mention, too, is that in pursuing and by filing the petition
today, that does effectuate a stay, which is important to emphasize that under the statute.
Again, recognizing how important these water resources are when somebody challenges them,
we say, hold on. And there's a pause there to let the challenge play out. So I think that kind
of summarizes the process. But obviously, Rob and I, whoever can field if there's follow
questions on the legal process stuff.
That's great. Thank you, Evan. And thank you, Rob. Before we go to our next question,
I just want to note that I see a raised hand. Instead of raised hand, if you would go ahead
and just put your questions right into either the chat or the Q&A feature, that's the best way we
can sort of order those questions and get them answered for you. Okay, so our next question
is about observation along the proposed, the route of the proposed construction.
So the question is, has there been any, have there been any new observations along the route,
such as significant erosion, which could expose the pipeline or pose other risks.
Our reporter here notes that the issues, these issues are highlighted during some of the federal
court hearings. And so perhaps Chairman Blanchard or others might want to speak to that.
I will know, I believe Stephanie Sosie, attorney with Earth Justice, is with us as well and might
be able to offer some insight there.
Yeah, I'd be happy to. So the question is, have there been any new observations along the
along line fives route on the bad river, such as significant erosion, which could expose
the pipeline or pose other risks. These issues were highlighted during some of the federal court
hearings. So you're talking about the where the pipeline is currently going across the reservation?
Yes, I apologize. I misspoke earlier. Yes, we have an area out there which is known to us as,
we call the meander, which the river is changing course and it does that, you know, different
throughout. It's the way it runs, you know, and it just wants to change the course.
And at this one place, the line crosses that and it is starting to go that way. And it's
probably 10, 11 feet away from the pipeline now. And if we have high water events, flooding
where harsh winter with a lot of ice build up and when all that breaks loose in the spring,
and we get this high water that could take very well, take that pipeline out and cause a spill.
So we are monitoring that quite regularly. Our natural resource department here has
cameras out there that they use to monitor. The location is quite difficult to get to.
It goes down a big steep embankment and crosses the river and so it takes a little bit to get to it.
But they do from time to time go on and do some measurements. So yes, we do monitor it. We also had
a few years back, we had an exposed pipeline coming down one of the side hills out there,
which I think they call it slope 18 or something like that. I can't remember exactly, but
there was about quite a ways where the pipe was exposed and just kind of hanging in midair,
you know, and which could have been disastrous if it wasn't found in something done about it.
So yes, there is areas out there that we are very concerned about.
Thank you, Chairman Blanchard. We have one quick clarifying question about next steps.
Will the work, excuse me, it says,
So no work will begin until the challenge is addressed. Is that correct?
Yeah, I can't.
If you, or I'm sorry, please go ahead.
This is cleaning up or I asked, uh, elaborating on what I said before. So I said there'll be a pause
because we filed the challenge that, um, stay of the permits effect effectiveness is in place
unless and until the administer of law judge who hears the case decides otherwise. So
what that means in practice is at some point, DNR will presumably grant the permit, uh, or the
petition. It'll get assigned to an ALJ and the ALJ can be presented with evidence by the other
parties if they wish saying, well, a stay is not really necessary here. And the ALJ could live
this day. We don't think that would be warranted here because the standard to keep the stay in place
till the whole case is done is have you made a demonstration that proceeding with the construction
would cause significant environmental harms and we think that's kind of an ill brainer here.
And indeed, it's, it's sort of telling that the legislature decided, hey, when so many files,
one of these wetland and waterways permits that stops things until the permits done unless the
ALJ decides otherwise. So it's a presumption of a stay until it's done, but there would be an
opportunity for the ALJ to lift it if they were convinced that there was no prospect of significant
harms if the project proceeded. Of course, you can't unfill a wetlands. So that's a hard standard
for the other side to meet, but that is legally possible. Yeah, I just want to clarify, as you said,
significant environmental harms, I think the first time you may have got it the second time,
but part of that standard is that those harms will be irreversible. And that's why wetlands
or evidence says you can't unfill a wetland, just like you can't put bedrock together right after
you exploded, right? These are things that cannot be undone and that are the product of complex
processes over years and decades and even millennia, right? And those can't be quickly or at all
undone. They're irreversible.
Great. Thanks, Evan and Rob. Our next question has to do with similarities between
the bans, petitions, and the petition submitted jointly by MEA and Clean Wisconsin. So I'm hoping
maybe Rob and or Evan, you could just review for us at a high level the similar any similarities
between the petitions. And in particular, there's a question about whether the respect or the
various petitions deal only with environmental review or with the permits themselves. And I
understand that there is also some interplay between those. So I don't know which one of you
might want to start first with that. All answer I can start. I'll just say that
we reviewed this independently. And in fact, didn't see, right, like for example,
the tribe's petition until it was filed today, right? And so we independently reviewed that
until the extent that you see similarities, I would suggest that that just goes to
the impacts here, right? And the fact that we're reaching the same conclusions based on
that review. And so I'm sure there are similarities, right? I'm talking about things like the lack
of sufficient information. I think Enbridge often just buries agencies and groups like ours in paper
and hopes that we won't be able to tell the difference, right, between, you know,
applicable information that goes to the permit standards and information that is very general
or vague and doesn't go to those immediate impacts. But we can tell the difference. And then the
second question there is know the filings today do not only deal with the environmental review
process, which is what concluded back in September, but also challenges the permits, right, that
that environmental review process under underlies. And so the wetland and waterway, stormwater,
water quality certification decisions that DNR must issue for Enbridge to be able to construct
the pipeline here in Wisconsin. Thank you, Rob. There are no more questions
here in the chat or through the Q&A. And so we'll go ahead and wrap up our press conference. I want
to thank you all, all of our speakers for being here today, members of the media for joining us.
If you have additional questions, please feel free to reach out to me. My information is
in the press advisory that was issued this morning. In addition, we've got contact
information there for the communications directors at Clean Wisconsin and at Earth Justice.
Thanks again for being here. And take care.
Thank you.