US Army Corps grants emergency status for Enbridge Line 5 tunnel

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By Valerie Volcovici

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Wednesday granted Enbridge’s proposed tunnel for its Line 5 pipeline national energy emergency status, fast-tracking a key federal permitting process.

President Donald Trump had ordered the Army Corps to issue permits enabling the filling of wetlands and dredging or building in waterways as part of the January 20 emergency energy declaration, which was aimed at expanding U.S. energy production to meet projected soaring demand.

The Army Corps, a federal engineering service, has permitting authority over projects involving wetlands and waterways.

In its public notice, the Army Corps’s Detroit district said the emergency permit request met the terms of Trump’s executive order because it addresses “an energy supply situation which would result in an unacceptable hazard to life, a significant loss of property, or an immediate, unforeseen, and significant economic hardship” if not acted upon more quickly.

Michigan regulators had approved Enbridge’s application to build a $750 million tunnel under the Great Lakes to house its aging Line 5 oil pipeline in 2023, but the project had awaited Army Corps permitting.

The Army Corps had been conducting an environmental impact study of the pipeline with input from affected Native American tribes.

The Army Corps had initially posted in February a list of more than 600 projects requiring faster environmental approvals, but then quickly removed the list from its website to give the agency more time to vet projects.

(Reporting by Valerie Volcovici; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)