Reversing an intermediate appellate court, the Michigan Supreme Court vacated the Michigan Public Service Commission’s (PSC’s) approval of an application by Enbridge Energy Limited Partnership (Enbridge) to replace and relocate a portion of its Line 5 fuel pipeline to a tunnel beneath the Straits of Mackinac. First, the Supreme Court held the Court of Appeals should have reviewed the PSC’s approval independently and de novo. Second, the Supreme Court concluded that the PSC failed to fully assess whether the Line 5 replacement project would “factually and proximately cause Line 5’s extended operation” and that the PSC erred by considering the environmental impacts of the entire scope of alternatives while only considering the harms of replacement project. In addition, the Supreme Court found that the PSC erred by failing to consider pollution, impairment, and destruction of public trust resources in its Michigan Environmental Protection Act analysis. The Supreme Court remanded to the PSC for further proceedings. One justice partially dissented. Although he agreed that the PSC must independently consider the public trust, he wrote that the majority should have afforded a “degree of deference” to the PSC’s decision, and he disagreed with the majority’s conclusion “that the continued operation of Line 5 is itself a relevant adverse environmental effect” of the replacement project. He also wrote that the consideration of alternatives should be limited to feasible alternatives to the replacement project, not Line 5 as a whole.

Challenge to order approving Enbridge Energy, Limited Partnership’s application to replace and relocate a segment of the Line 5 oil pipeline crossing the Straits of Mackinac. 

In re Application of Enbridge Energy to Replace & Relocate Line 5 (Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians v. Michigan Public Service Commission)

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Michigan Supreme Court Vacated Approval for Enbridge’s Line 5 Replacement Project

Filed

United States of America

Michigan

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Michigan Supreme Court Vacated Approval for Enbridge’s Line 5 Replacement Project

Policy instrument

Risk

Impacted group

Fossil fuel

Greenhouse gas

Economic sector

Adaptation/resilience

Finance