For 65 years, Enbridge’s Line 5 has been a critically important conduit for moving Western Canadian and Bakken crude oil and NGLs east across Michigan’s upper and lower peninsulas and into Ontario, where the now-540-Mb/d pipeline feeds Sarnia refineries and petrochemical plants. Some crude from Line 5 also can flow east from Sarnia to Montreal refineries on Line 9. But Enbridge has been under increasing pressure to shut down Line 5 over concern that a rupture under the Straits of Mackinac might cause major environmental damage. At long last, the state of Michigan and Enbridge have reached an agreement to replace the section of Line 5 under the straits by the mid-2020s, and to take steps in the interim to enhance the existing pipeline’s safety. In today’s blog, we consider the significance of the Enbridge pipeline and of the newly reached accord.
The Crude Voyager is a weekly analysis of U.S. Gulf Coast loading activity that explains the ebbs and flows of crude loadings, destinations, and geopolitical issues impacting U.S. exports. It outlines the major paths for laden tankers hauling U.S. crude all over the world and reflects the change in tanker departures to the main regions that consume U.S. crude.
As any music lover or sports fan knows, the Mick Jaggers and Tom Bradys of the world get all the attention, but lesser-known members of the band or the team help make the stars shine. The same holds true in the midstream sector, as evidenced by Enbridge’s Line 5 (purple line in Figure 1), a 645-mile pipeline that is part of the company’s much larger Canadian Mainline and Lakehead systems. Line 5 originates at the company’s terminal in Superior, WI, and runs east/southeast through Michigan to Sarnia, ON. The Superior terminal is the end point for five elements of the Mainline/Lakehead systems — Line 1, Line 3 and Line 4 from Edmonton, AB; Line 67 from Hardisty, AB; and Line 2B from Cromer, MB — and has the capacity to handle 2.8 MMb/d of incoming and outgoing liquid hydrocarbons (most of them light, medium or heavy crudes). Line 5 is one of five pipelines out of Superior; it transports “batches” of either light crude, light synthetic crude or NGLs that are sourced primarily in Western Canada (and also in the Bakken) and bound for either Michigan, Sarnia or Montreal (see Refined, Piped, Delivered – They’re Yours for an explanation of how batching works.) At the Straits of Mackinac (dashed red oval) — the four-mile-wide water passage between Michigan’s upper and lower peninsulas (and Lake Michigan and Lake Superior) — the 30-inch-diameter, single-pipe Line 5 splits into two 20-inch-diameter, parallel pipes that are anchored along the strait’s lakebed.
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About the song
“Tunnel of Love” is the title track on Bruce Springsteen’s eighth studio album, which was released in 1987. All of the songs on the LP were written by Springsteen, and all of the lead vocals and most of the instrumentation were performed by him too; E Street Band members added parts to various songs on the album, but it is considered a Springsteen solo record. The album was recorded between January and July of 1987 at various locations, with Springsteen, Jon Landau and Chuck Plotkin producing. The LP went to #1 on the Billboard 200 Top Albums chart and went triple-platinum in the U.S. The “Tunnel of Love” single went to #9 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Bruce Springsteen is an American singer-songwriter and musician. He has sold more than 135 million records worldwide — almost half of those in the U.S. “The Boss” has released 18 studio albums and five live albums so far in his career. He has won one Academy Award (for “Streets of Philadelphia”), two Golden Globe Awards, five MTV Video Music Awards and 20 Grammys. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1999, and the New Jersey Hall of Fame in 2007. He was a Kennedy Center Honors recipient in 2009, was named the MusiCares Person of the Year in 2013, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016.
