Enbridge pushes Line 3 timeline back a year

The Enbridge Energy company has announced that the Line 3 oil pipeline replacement project will go into service a year later than anticipated.

Enbridge had planned to begin construction of the controversial pipeline replacement project this spring, and has said throughout the permitting process that the line would be in service by the end of 2019.

But the company said Friday that it now doesn't expect the new northern Minnesota pipeline to enter service until the second half of 2020. Enbridge needs several state and federal permits in hand before it can break ground.

Enbridge said in a news release Friday that the delay comes after the state of Minnesota provided a timeline for the state permits it still needs in order to begin construction. It said it expects the state to issue its final permits by November, with the remaining federal and local permits to follow. The company said it is now revising its timeline for pipeline construction.

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"We support a robust and transparent permitting process that includes opportunity for public input," Al Monaco, Enbridge CEO said in the statement. "We'll continue to work closely with State officials during this process."

The controversial project would replace an aging pipeline that carries oil from the tar sands of Alberta, Canada, across the state of Minnesota. It has been divisive from the start — since Enbridge Energy filed its plans to replace the current Line 3 pipeline nearly four years ago — and has drawn strong opposition from environmental groups and created a complicated equation for Native American tribes across the state, some of whose land the old pipeline crosses and whose treaty territory the new pipeline would cut through.

Supporters of Line 3 say the project will create thousands of construction jobs and generate millions of dollars in property tax revenue for the northern Minnesota counties the new pipeline will cross.

But pipeline opponents have also been applying pressure, arguing that building it would worsen climate change, violate Native American treaty rights and threaten northern Minnesota's waterways.

In June 2018, state regulators on the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission approved Enbridge's plans to replace the old Line 3, the capacity of which has been reduced significantly since it first went into service in the 1960s. It is one of five Enbridge pipelines that, together, carry more than 2.5 million barrels of Canadian oil every day across northern Minnesota.

But last month, Gov. Tim Walz announced his Commerce Department would continue with a challenge to the project that the state initiated last year. Several additional legal challenges to the project are in progress, and more are expected.

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