As spring thaws Minnesota ice, another pipeline battle breaks out

Originally built in the 1960s, the Enbridge Line 3 crude oil pipeline winds 1,097 miles between the oil sands of Canada and Superior, Wisconsin. Of the roughly 340 miles through Minnesota, the replacement pipeline includes new sections and additional capacity and passes through some of North America’s most pristine woods and wetlands. In the small camps along the way, a small but growing group of protesters are there to stop them, driven by old prophecies and promises of a new president.

In Ojibwe tribal lore, an environmental moment of calculation has been predicted around the time of the Seventh Fire, when “the fair-skinned race will have a choice of two roads,” one green and lush, the other black and charred. A wrong choice, it was warned, “would cause great suffering and death to all people on Earth.” The Ojibwe are one of the largest groups of Native Americans in northern Mexico with tribal members stretching from present-day Ontario in eastern Canada to Montana.

“More than 130 people have been arrested so far in recent months,” lawyer and tribal activist Tara Houska told CNN. Some are physically arrested at construction sites, but police are also watching social media feeds to identify protesters breaking into trespassing and mailing summons. Before walking on the frozen river, Houska attended her hearing with a judge about Zoom and was ordered to post $ 6,000 bail.

“They seem to think that is going to deter us from protecting the earth. They fundamentally lack in knowing what the protectors of the water are doing, who is willing to put our freedom, our body, our personal comfort on the line for anything more. bigger than ourselves, ”Houska said.

After living in Washington and fighting Dakota Access and Keystone XL, she now hopes that this move will help convince the Biden administration that the Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency under the Trump administration were shoddy in their work. environmental impact studies and too hasty in issuing permits. .

But Canadian pipeline giant Enbridge insists it has passed all federal, state and tribal tests. The company rushed to complete the pipeline before politics or the courts could stop it. Of these 340 miles that cross the land of 10,000 lakes, more than 40% are already buried.

“Line 3 is not like the Keystone XL pipeline,” Enbridge communications director Mike Fernandez told CNN. “It already exists. And it’s already an energy lifeline for literally millions of people in the United States and Canada. And the reality is, even though we see strong growth in renewables, we’re still going to need fossil fuels for 40 years to come. “

A trip to the tar sands surprises the mind with its magnitude. Massive man-made pits crawl with huge dump trucks, filled with what looks like sticky cookie dough and smells of asphalt.

Tens of thousands of tons are transported every day to massive processing plants where the goop is boiled and blasted with water from the Athabasca River heated with natural gas. To separate flammable bitumen from dirt and clay, it takes six gallons of fresh water to produce one gallon of oil sands gasoline, and the lakes needed to contain the resulting toxic waste are among the largest man-made creations of the story.

But for the workers who build Line 3, pipelines are safer and cleaner than transporting oil by truck or train. And if you shut down line 3, they say, it does nothing to stop the world’s voracious demand for the kind of fuels that are burning.

“I think, frankly, people were drawn to pipelines because pipelines are easy to fight,” said Kevin Pranis of the International Union of Workers of North America as the cranes lifted pipes. of 25,000 pounds as long as city buses.

“The truth is, carbon emissions don’t come from pipelines. They come from cars. And so if you really wanted to go straight to the source, you can protest car dealers, you can protest gas stations. But the problem is, people love car dealerships and they love gas stations and they’d be pretty mad about that. “

While most of the 5,200 people building Line 3 are from oil states like Texas and Louisiana, “some 400 will be Native Americans,” Fernandez told me. “We have met all the First Nations along this pipeline. We’ve listened, and as a result, there are about 320 plot changes.

Enbridge’s tribal relations suffered in February, when two men working on Line 3 were caught in a human trafficking sting aimed at protecting underage Indigenous girls.

“The two individuals who were arrested were fired.” Fernandez said. “We do not tolerate this kind of activity or behavior and that prompted us to go to one of the entrepreneurs and say, ‘It is our expectation that they be trained to a certain level’.

Follow the route of the pipeline and feelings may change depending on the tribe or the mile.

“Do you think people rushing around their homes, running out of gas and no heat, are thinking about climate change?” Jim Jones said. “They’re thinking about how they’re going to heat their house and put food on the table.”

As a member of the Leech Lake Band of the Ojibwe and a former cultural anthropology expert for the state, Enbridge hired Jones to walk the route of the pipeline and ensure there were no violations of spaces or landmarks. indigenous ruins.

“I am at peace because I have done my best to protect what is important to us,” he said. “And I can honestly tell you that to date nothing of historical context has been unearthed or disturbed.”

After the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa struck an agreement with Enbridge to operate part of Line 3 on their reserve, the tribal chiefs said they were in an impossible position. Some tribes have worked with Enbridge on the road, while others like Winona LaDuke of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe have nothing but contempt for Enbridge.

LaDuke laughed when told about Jones’ promise. “He’s looking for pot graphics and arrowheads. We’re living people.”

LaDuke is a longtime environmental activist who twice ran for vice president on Ralph Nader’s Green Party ticket, but after fighting for indigenous rights against extractive energy companies for for years, she never imagined the fight would come back to her.

“Enbridge wants to criminalize us,” she said. “I’m a grandmother, you know, a Harvard graduate, ran for vice president twice, when did I become a criminal?” I’m just wondering, ‘How many risks should we as Americans take so that a Canadian multinational can have a little bit richer at the end of the oil sands era? “

She helped convince a sympathetic local to sell them a small piece of land where the pipeline crosses the Mississippi and as the weather warms protesters are hoping their numbers of tents, yurts and fly fishing huts will increase. faster than Enbridge can break through in frost. Mississippi.

“Our people say, ‘Don’t fight with Mother Nature. You can’t win, and we get pounded. So why would you want to install the equivalent of 50 new coal-fired power plants with this? “LaDuke said pointing to line 3.

“The tar sands are the gun. It’s the trigger.”