Enbridge says it plans to restart 6B on Monday

Enbridge Energy announced Thursday during a press briefing that it planned to restart the Lakehead Pipeline 6B on Monday Sept. 27, with one caveat — they are awaiting final approval from federal regulators.

“With PHMSA’s approval of our restart plan yesterday we will now execute that plan in preparation for a safe return to service for Line 6B,” said CEO Patrick Daniel. “Enbridge now anticipates that we’ll meet the restart plan’s requirements and be in a position to return 6B to service the morning of Monday September 27th, subject again to receipt of final PHMSA approval.”

Under that start up plan, the company will slowly bring the line back up to pressure and start moving oil from Griffith IN to Sarnia Ontario in the 286 mile long pipeline. The start up will be monitored by workers from Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The line will be operating at 20 percent lower volume and pressure than it had been when a section of pipeline in Marshall ruptured in July, spewing over a million gallons into a wetland, the Talmadge Creek and the Kalamazoo River. The spill contaminated nearly 35 miles of the river, and was stopped just before Morrow Lake in Kalamazoo county, just a few miles from the beginning of a Kalamazoo River Superfund location.

The line is a key component of the nation’s oil supply. Enbridge delivers about 12% of the oil the U.S. imports from Canada each year. Canada is the nation’s number one supplier of oil.

After the rupture occurred, it was determined that the line was riddled with anomalies which by federal oversight regulations required inspection, replacement and/or repair. Hundreds of identified problems in the line had been left unchecked by Enbridge, which had requested an additional two and half years to determine a plan to deal with those anomalies. That request was rejected by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration of the U.S. Department of Transportation two weeks ago. Enbridge was ordered by the agency to develop a plan to address those anomalies before it could restart the line.

Among those anomalies discovered was a 12 inch dent on the line as it passes under the St. Clair River. That water area supplies drinking water to much of southeast Michigan. Enbridge says it will introduce a plan to deal with that dent by Sunday.

“Also, as part of our integrity validation and remedial action plan, to be submitted to the Office of Pipeline Safety by September 26th, Enbridge will present our plans to replace approximately 3,800 feet of pipe under the St. Clair River,” said Daniel. “Subject to regulatory permits and a successful horizontal bore, the new pipeline segment should be installed and operational by mid-year of 2011.”

Congressman Mark Schauer (D-Bedford Township) declined to comment on the planned restart. He has been a vocal critic of the company and its pipeline safety, announcing two weeks ago in Congressional testimony that he didn’t trust the company to operate the line safely. Schauer has introduced legislation which would require pipeline operators to report spills and ruptures within one hour of detection. That legislation is slated for a Tuesday vote in the U.S. House.

In other oil spill news, officials from both the EPA and Enbridge announced they expected the number of people working on the spill response and clean up to drop dramatically over the next two weeks. Both said they expected the work force, which is currently 1,700 workers, to decline to 500 workers. Enbridge said it expected to continue to employ about 500 people through October.

EPA and Enbridge also announced that the company has separated about 700,000 gallons of oil from the oil and water collected from the spill. That oil will be put back into the pipeline system Enbridge officials said.