Coast Guard's Alarming Warning on Great Lakes Oil Spill

The U.S. Coast Guard says it is ill equipped to effectively respond to ”heavy oil” spills that could result if a major pipeline breach occurred below the Great Lakes. (Photo: U.S. Coast Guard)

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The U.S. Coast Guard has a dire warning as top Michigan officials are bearing down on Canada’s Enbridge Energy to reinforce its pipelines under the Great Lakes:

If there’s a “heavy oil” spill – the kind with far-reaching environmental and economic implications on Michigan’s wildlife and multibillion-dollar fishing and boating industries – there’s not much the Coast Guard can do about it.

Rear Admiral Fred Midgett, commander of the Coast Guard’s District 9, said various agencies are at the table frantically working on a spill response plan, but so far, none is capable of adequately responding to a major spill, the Detroit Free Press reports.

Midgett made his remarks during an international forum on heavy oils at the Detroit-Wayne County Port Authority, attended by chemical and oil-spill professionals.

His remarks were underscored by a candid 2013 report by the Coast Guard Research and Development, which pointed out deficiencies in traditional skimming recovery methods in dealing with heavy oil, which sinks below the surface.

Responders have to “reinvent” recovery techniques when dealing with heavy oil spills, and responses to some recent high profile submerged oil spills show responders “have almost no capability in detection and recovery,” the report said.

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The gloomy prognosis is disturbing to environmental groups, including the Sierra Club’s Michigan chapter.

“How can Michigan and the Great Lakes be in a position where two large oil pipelines are operating underneath the Straits of Mackinac, and the lead responders – the first responders to an oil spill – say they couldn’t respond effectively if something happened to those pipes?” David Holz, the Michigan chairman, told the Free Press.

Environmental consultant Beth Wallace said report is “just a scary scenario for the Great Lakes.” Wallace, whose consultant work focuses on oil pipeline transport issue, said Gov. Rick Snyder and a pipeline safety take force should “take a hard look at this.”

In July, Attorney General Bill Schuette and Department of Environmental Quality Director Dan Wyant gave Enbridge Energy 60 days to tell the state how the company plans to reinforce 60-year-old oil pipelines beneath the Straits of Mackinac. The two have convened a task force studying oil-spill preparedness and pipeline safety throughout the state.

In a study published earlier this year, a University of Michigan expert warned of an environmental disaster if the Straits f Mackinac pipelines, which carry up to 23 million gallons of crude oil and natural gas fluids each day, were breached.

“I can’t think – in my experience – of another place on the Great Lakes where an oil spill would have as wide an area of impact, in as short of time, as at the Straits of Mackinac,” the study’s author, David Schwab, a research scientist at the U-M Water Center.

» Read more about the forum on the Detroit Free Press.