It’s about sheet pilings and a failed regulatory system
This post was written in collaboration with Waadookawaad Amikwag.
Construction of the Enbridge Line 3 tar sands pipeline has created at least four artesian aquifer breaches – at Clearbrook, LaSalle Valley, Fond du Lac, and Moose Lake – all from the same cause: Driving sheet pilings too deep into the ground. A fifth site – Walker Brook – technically might not count as an artesian aquifer breach, but the environmental damage there is significant and needs to remain in the public eye.
Line 3’s 337-mile route went through many areas with high water tables, making it difficult to install the pipeline. If workers starting digging a trench, it would quickly fill with water.
Construction workers would drive 30-foot-tall sheet pilings into the ground, one on each side of the planned trench. The goal was to block groundwater flow into the trench so it would be dry enough to work.
However, Line 3 also crosses lands with shallow artesian aquifers. These are areas where groundwater is held underground, under pressure, by an impervious layer of soil, such as clay. Break the clay seal with a sheet piling and the water rushes to the surface.
Enbridge either didn’t do its homework on artesian aquifer locations on Line 3’s route, or it chose to be willfully ignorant of them. Either way, it kept repeating the same kind of damage.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) failed to intervene effectively. It wrote a weak permit. It didn’t even know the amount or location of the sheet pilings Enbridge used for the project.
Randall Doneen, Section Manager for the DNRs’ Conservation Assistance and Regulation unit, wrote Healing Minnesota Stories: “We do not have sheet piling locations across the entire line. When we investigate specific locations we get the sheet piling information on that location from the company.”
Image from Enbridge’s Corrective Action Implementation Report.
Line 3 construction crossed 78 miles of wetlands, more than 20 percent of its entire route. Workers must have used miles and miles of sheet pilings, meaning they likely did more damage.
Having multiple aquifer breaches, all with the same cause, is a red flag about the DNR’s ability to oversee construction projects.
It’s an even bigger red flag about Enbridge’s trustworthiness.
The problems are worse than what is publicly known.
For a summary of the aquifer breaches, their causes, and damages, click here.
Volunteers with Waadookawaad Amikwag (Anishinaabemowin for “Those Who Help Beaver”) have been monitoring the Line 3 corridor since construction ended, using both drones and volunteers making on-the-ground observations to document environmental damage.
Based on drone thermal imaging, Waadookawaad Amikwag (WA) estimates there are up to 45 breach sites. It calls the aquifer breaches an unprecedented and unpermitted release of Minnesota’s groundwater.
These aquifer breaches never should have
happened because the Line 3 route
never should have been approved.
Jeffrey Broberg, an independent geologist who supports WA’s work, recalled that during the DNR’s Line 3 permitting, Enbridge claimed it couldn’t determine where sheet pilings were needed or how much they would use. They said they would leave it to their managers and contractors to make the call in the field.
Information on sheet piles should have been available, he said.
“Sheet pile is a pay item, a line item in pipeline contracts,” Broberg said. “Enbridge most certainly had a budget for it. Sheet pile is also required to be documented on ‘As-built plans,’ but Enbridge claims these plans are private and need to be protected due to pipeline security issues.”
“They wouldn’t be bringing sheet piling in if they didn’t expect to use it,” he said.
Flawed DNR permit
The DNR approved Enbridge’s “License to Cross Public Waters” (call it a water crossing permit).
Broberg said the DNR’s permit should have required Enbridge to disclose sheet piling locations. Further, the DNR should have required Enbridge to conduct hydrological investigations at any construction sites that required sheet piling.
“They should have done at least six soil borings at LaSalle Valley, and required them to sample 10 feet deeper that the sheet pilings would go.”
The Fond du Lac breach site is a good example of why the test borings need to go that deep.
Artesian aquifers often have hard confining layer, such as clay. The Fond du Lac site had a particularly weak confining layer, made of “native silts and fine sands,” according to Enbridge reports.
Line 3 workers drove sheet pilings 27 feet into the ground. The aquifer’s confining layer was approximately 30 to 39 feet deep. However, workers used vibrating hammers to install and remove sheet pilings. Enbridge believes the Fond du Lac breach occurred because the vibrations “liquefied” the silt-and-sand aquifer cap below the pilings.
Waadookawaad Amikwag and others say that DNR and MPCA need a thorough investigation of all sheet pile locations along Line 3’s route. They need to do their own drone surveys with thermal imaging that can detect groundwater flow. Most importantly, the state needs to take enforcement action and require ongoing permits and monitoring for each and every aquifer breach.
The damage is permanent, so the permitting and monitoring needs to be permanent, Broberg said.
Back to the beginning
The environmental damage from Line 3 construction represents a confluence of a complex regulatory system, a lack of accountability, and flat-out poor decisions.
These aquifer breaches never should have happened because the Line 3 route never should have been approved.
While there were several systemic failures, this post focuses on state regulators’ failure to follow pipeline routing rules (below).
At the state level, Line 3 permitting started with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC), a quasi judicial body with five commissioners appointed by the governor. Among its decisions, the PUC approved Enbridge’s “preferred” route, and did so in violation of state rules.
If the state’s regulatory system was ever going to enforce the pipeline routing rules, Line 3 was its opportunity to do so.
Enbridge still needed two dozen other approvals, including the DNR’s water crossing permit.
According to DNR policy,: “It is essential to regulate utility crossings of public lands and waters in order to provide maximum protection and preservation of the natural environment and to minimize any adverse effects which may result from utility crossings.”
The Public Utilities Commission put the DNR in a tough spot by approving a disastrous pipeline route.
The DNR could have, and should have, denied the project’s water crossing permit. However, the department said the PUC’s decision preempted its authority. It refused to challenge the PUC’s flawed decision.
DNR: Blame the PUC
The DNR held public hearings on Enbridge’s water crossing permit; Native Nations, environmental groups, and members of the public registered strong criticisms.
The DNR provided written responses to public comments. While not stated this bluntly, a typical DNR response effectively said: “Don’t blame us. Blame the PUC.”
The Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa wrote the Line 3 route would “cross at least 5 lakes and 62 rivers or streams in the Anishinaabe and Dakota territories … Any one (or all) of these bodies of nibi [water] could [be] devastated by the proposed Line 3. Any contamination would not only harm the nibi, which we are spiritually connected to, as well as our giigoonh (fish) relatives…”
“DNR Response: The PUC, not the DNR, has the authority to issue the pipeline routing permit for the Project…”
DNR decision on Line 3’s water crossing permit
And this:
Friends of the Headwaters commented that the DNR must independently evaluate the route.
“DNR Response: The PUC, not the DNR, has the authority to issue the pipeline routing permit for the Project.”
DNR decision on Line 3’s water crossing permit
Approving the permit
Enbridge’s first application to Cross Public Waters, submitted to the DNR in 2018, should have sounded an alarm. Enbridge admitted it “wasn’t feasible” to build Line 3 along its preferred route and meet Minnesota’s environmental standards, “with a project of this scope and size, given northern Minnesota’s topography and environment.”
Enbridge specifically said it could not meet the state’s pipeline routing rules.
In order to stay in line with the PUC’s decision, the DNR turned to fuzzy logic.
The permit said “An applicant for a utility crossing license is required to comply with these [routing] standards, except when the DNR determines that it is not feasible and prudent, or not in the best interests of the environment.”
Here are passages from the DNR’s final water crossing permit for Line 3.
“Minn. R. 6135.1100, subp. 1(A), requires utility crossings to avoid steep slopes. Due to the nature of the Project and the route prescribed by the RP [PUC’s Route Permit], the DNR determines that it is not feasible and prudent for the project to avoid all steep slopes along the RP for public waters crossings. …”
“Minn. R. 6135.1100, subp. 2(A), requires utility crossings to … avoid wetlands. The PUC, not the DNR, has the authority to issue the pipeline RP [Route Permit] and therefore entirely avoiding wetlands is not feasible. …”
“Minn. R. 6135.1100, subp. 4, requires that crossings on or under the beds of streams designated by the DNR as trout waters shall be avoided unless there is no feasible alternative. … the DNR determines it is not feasible and prudent for the Application to avoid all trout waters.”
It sounds official enough, but let’s untangle the logic: The DNR doesn’t have to follow the pipeline routing — rules meant to protect the environment — if it determines: 1) “it is not in the best interests of the environment,” or 2) it determines those rules aren’t “feasible and prudent.”
“Feasible and prudent” for whom? Apparently for Enbridge.
Feasible and prudent for whom?
To translate, the DNR is saying: It’s not feasible and prudent for Enbridge to follow state rules if it is going to build the pipeline it wants, where it wants. Minnesota regulators are supposed to be deciding what is reasonable and prudent for the state, not for Enbridge.
Of course it’s “feasible and prudent” to avoid steep slopes, wetlands, and trout streams. It would mean rejecting the permit.
True, the PUC gets to decide the pipeline route, but that shouldn’t stop the DNR from acting on its own authority and deny the permit. Undoubtedly Enbridge would sue, but the DNR could have made a strong case in court.
The DNR didn’t even try.
If the state isn’t going to enforce the pipeline routing rules in such an obvious case, why are they still on the books? Why go through this licensing charade if its preordained the DNR will rubber stamp the PUC’s decision?
Enbridge’s final water crossing permit application used the term “sheet piling” just once. It cited the need for expanded workspace for such things as “significant amounts of sheet piling.”
As part of its water crossing permit application, Enbridge submitted a 567-page Environmental Protection Plan. It used the words “sheet piling” or “sheet-piling” 20 times. Most of the references have nothing on their potential environmental risks.
There is one reference of note [PDF pages 172]:
At potential sheet-piling locations, a test hole may be dug in proximity to the crossing location to assess soil stability and other conditions (e.g., bedrock, cobbles, boulders), and to determine if the crossing will be conducive to the installation of sheet piling. Based on these results, a decision will be made between Enbridge Construction and the Environmental Compliance team.
Enbridge’s Environmental Protection Plan
The language is permissive, not mandatory. It doesn’t say “a test hole must be dug,” it says “a test hole may be dug,” so Enbridge wasn’t required to do it. (Did Enbridge drill any test holes?)
Enbridge’s language anticipates the test hole might find bedrock, cobbles, or boulders, but there’s no mention of the possibly of hitting an artesian aquifer.
Nowhere in its Environmental Protection Plan does Enbridge mention the environmental risks of driving sheet-piling into the ground and breaching an aquifer.
The DNR approved Line 3/93’s water crossing permit Nov. 11, 2020, three weeks before construction started.
The 41-page document used the word “sheet piling” twice, both in reference to Line 3’s LaSalle Valley crossing. Ironically, LaSalle is one of the breach sites. The permit states:
DNR has conducted a rigorous review of the Application to ensure that adverse impacts on the environment from construction of the project are minimized. The DNR has determined the project meets these standards.
Line 3 Water Crossing Permit, page 7
That statement doesn’t hold water.
The Line 3 double standard
The state provided lax oversight of Line 3 construction while water protectors were put under the microscope.
The PUC approved creating an Enbridge-funded escrow account to reimburse state and local law enforcement agencies to monitor, harass, and arrest water protectors. (The PUC’s language didn’t say harass, but that was the effect.)
The arrangement encouraged law enforcement agencies to give undue scrutiny to those opposed to the pipeline; it was a money maker. Some county sheriffs billed for routine patrols of Line 3 work sites and coordinating meetings with Enbridge security.
In effect, this plan allowed Enbridge to use local law enforcement as its private security.
At the same time, the PUC approved a plan to use contracted “Independent Environmental Monitors” (IEMs) to be state regulatory agencies’ eyes and ears on the ground during construction. (The thought was state agencies didn’t have enough staff to do the monitoring.)
Under the plan, the IEMs worked directly for the state. Enbridge reimbursed the DNR, MPCA, and other state agencies for their salaries.
However – and this is a big however – the PUC allowed Enbridge to hire and train the IEMs. A point-in-time review found that 12 of 25 IEMs had prior work history with Enbridge, raising the question of how “independent” they were.
Broberg reviewed the IEM’s 75-page manual, “and the word ‘groundwater’ does not appear in the document,” he said. “They did not train anyone to look [for aquifer breaches].”
Another problem, the IEM’s did not have access to Line 3’s construction plans, so they had no way of knowing if workers were following plans or not.
Under the Public Utilities Commission’s (PUC) route permit, the IEMs’ role is to monitor compliance with the terms and conditions of the PUC, DNR, and MPCA permits. They do not monitor construction plans. Therefore, these inspections did not identify that Enbridge’s construction activities [at Clearbrook] had deviated from the company’s plans, breaching the aquifer’s confining layer.
DNR’s enforcement action against Enbridge for the Clearbrook breach
It’s one more thing the DNR’s water crossing permit could have required: IEMs need access to construction plans.
On one hand, the DNR wrote a weak permit. It depended on Enbridge-selected-and-trained monitors to provide the department with critical information on permit violations.
On the other hand, the DNR was the single largest recipient of Public Safety Escrow Account funds: $2.2 million, 25 percent of the reimbursements made.
At a minimum, it’s a bad look for the state.
Water protectors were in the field because they worried about all the damage Line 3 would cause. Approximately 1,000 people were arrested, many for trespass. But their worries have been proven correct.
Meanwhile, state regulators failed to protect the environment from Enbridge’s get-it-done-quickly approach, and have yet to tell us the full extent of the construction damage.
healingmnstories.wordpress.com 
This blog is really critical to understanding why any Line 5 project needs FULL DISCOVERY of the impacts we’re finding in Minnesota post-construction.
Miigwech, Scott, for capturing this important post-analysis on why Enbridge is NOT to be trusted.
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Miigwech, HMS, for continuing to cover the work we’re doing to show Enbridge damages along Line 3/93 as we continue to request from state agencies: No More Harm.
Watch for a call to action pending soon to help us Protect Moose Lake.
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