Protesters prevent pipe line crews from inspecting a line that will carry oil from the Alberta tar sands to Montreal – via Burlington.

News 100 redBy Staff

May 21, 2014

BURLINGTON, ON

It may have moved from  top of mind ‘for a lot of people but a local chapter of the Council of Canadians activists, local residents, allies and First Nations blockaded the access road to an exposed section of Enbridge’s Line 9 pipeline Tuesday morning.

The blockade was to be twelve hours in length as a symbolic gesture; one hour for every thousand anomalies Enbridge has reported to exist on the line.

Line 9 demonstration May 20-14

Enbridge inspection workers were prevented from getting to their work site on Tuesday by protesters demonstrating against the National Energy Board decision to approve the direction of the flow through the line.

Line 9 - integrity dig

Integrity digs are when crews dig up the soil covering the pipe and inspecting it for cracks and possible leaks. They are checking on the “integrity” of the line and its ability to transport a product.

Thepress release from the blockade states that “Line 9 has at least 12961 structural weaknesses along its length. And yet, Enbridge is only doing a few hundred integrity digs. Enbridge has been denying the problems with the pipe for years, and they still refuse to do the hydrostatic testing requested by the province. Are we really supposed to simply trust Enbridge when they tell us that this time they’ll do it right?”

Many of the blockaders point to the disastrous spill from Enbridge’s line 6b into the Kalamazoo River in Michigan in 2010, where millions of litres of oil spilled and have so far proven impossible to clean up. They also point out testimony at the NEB that Line 9 has a 90% chance of catastrophic failure in the initial years after its operation is changed.

Line 9 - tar sands sign

For the Line 9 protesters the issue is transporting oil from the tar sands in Alberta through a pipe line that runs through Burlington.

This public demonstration in Burlington is the first seen since the National Energy Board approved the reversing of the flow in Line 9.  There were a significant number of conditions attached to the approval, one of which was a number of digs to determine the condition of the line that is almost 40 years old.

 

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3 comments to Protesters prevent pipe line crews from inspecting a line that will carry oil from the Alberta tar sands to Montreal – via Burlington.

  • Stephanie Cooper-Smyth

    I am ignorant on one fact:

    Where exactly in Burlington was the protest staged – where is the access road to an exposed section of Enbridge’s Line 9 pipeline?

    • The protest was held where the access (driveway) joins up with No 1 Side Road. From the 3rd photograph, you can see 5 people standing towards the end of the driveway of the old white clapboard farmhouse. The farm is located on the north side of No 1 SideRoad between Walker’s Line and Appleby Line. There were about 15 people protesting with a good media turnout but there were no Enbridge workers there while I was asking questions.
      Jennifer

  • I know that progressives like to denigrate Alberta’s bitumen deposits by calling them, “Tar Sands.” It is an ignorant thing to do, but they persist. A more correct term is “oil sands” since bitumen, unlike tar, is an oil-based substance.

    Bitumen is sometimes confused with tar, perhaps because bitumen and coal tar are black and sticky. They have, nevertheless, different origins, chemical compositions and properties. Tar or coal tar is produced from coal and is a by-product of gas and coke production, while bitumen is mined—thankfully, in great quantities in Western Canada and other places.