For quite a while now, we (like others) have been talking about the way Enbridge opportunistically took advantage of the climate of worry following the Marshall spill to hastily get approval to replace Line 6B in three segments and thereby circumvent regulatory processes, particularly the Presidential Permitting process that has kept Keystone XL in such limbo. We have also taken note of Enbridge’s various other schemes to out-Keystone Keystone. One has to admit: they are awfully crafty.

Just how crafty? Well, David Shaffer, who does outstanding work for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, has a great story this week about a very clever, very troubling bait-and-switch Enbridge is planning (in collusion, it appears, with the Department of State) to get more oil into the U.S. Essentially, Enbridge is going to ship oil from Canada to the U.S. border through one pipe, switch it to another to get it across the border, then switch it back to ship it to refineries. It’s a little bit like smuggling (but right out in the open).

Why the pipe-switching gymnastics? Well, this will allow Enbridge to evade the requirements of the Presidential Permits on their Alberta Clipper and Line 3 pipelines, which place restrictions on the amount of oil that can be shipped through them. It would also allow Enbridge to avoid the important public and environmental scrutiny– that is to say, the democratic process– that exists (ostensibly) to bring a little sanity and concern for the public interest to bear upon operations like Enbridge’s. The fact that our elected officials and regulatory agencies turn a blind eye to these kinds of shenanigans is a breach of the public trust, allowing foreign companies like Enbridge to trample upon landowners and the environment so that they can reap huge profits transporting tar sands oil destined mainly for export. In our view, it’s outrageous. and if not flatly illegal, then certainly “a clear misinterpretation of both the letter and the spirit of the law.”

First Rover, Now NEXUS

Oh, but there’s more. Also this week, just as the efforts of Michigan citizens to prevent an unnecessary natural gas pipeline project from tearing its way across half the state, another nearly identical project was announced. NEXUS Gas Transmission would move the same gas from and to the same places as ET Rover and take a very similar path. The main difference is that it appears that NEXUS will mainly use existing infrastructure and not require new construction. That’s okay news for landowners, but it’s not necessarily great news in general, as once again, we’re talking here mainly about gas from fracking operations in West Virginia and Pennsylvania destined for import to Canada.

But here’s the interesting part: whose existing infrastructure do you think is going to be used for NEXUS? You guessed it: Enbridge’s. Apparently, the gas would travel through the Vector pipeline system (many Line 6B landowners also have the Vector pipeline on their properties).

You might be asking yourself, at this point, “is Enbridge in bed with everybody?” The answer appears to be yes. Their fingerprints are everywhere. And now, after partnering with Energy Transfer to abandon a gas pipeline that they (and FERC) agreed was unnecessary so that Enbridge could use it to ship crude oil– after that, Enbridge is now going to compete with Energy Transfer to ship gas to the very same markets that they said a year ago didn’t need it. (Yes, our head is spinning to.) Even worse, it may well be that it is in Enbridge’s best interests to see the ET Rover project thwarted (although we fail to see how Enbridge and its NEXUS partners DTE and Spectra Energy can make the necessity argument against ET Rover, as that would only undermine their own application to FERC). At the very least, Enbridge surely will think that it is in its best interest for everyone to run around arguing that their scheme to transport natural gas across Michigan is more desirable than ET Rover’s scheme. Even more perversely, they may be sort of right on that point.

Which is all the more reason that Michiganders need to tell FERC that these projects– ET Rover and NEXUS alike– are not just about re-routing. Neither one is necessary. Neither one is in the public interest of Michigan. Neither one is a “public necessity.” Otherwise, the only real outcome is that Enbridge wins. Again.