"We expect them to fight this order with all of their corporate might. "We are under no illusion that Enbridge will do the right thing," Wiggins said. Instead, it will "create an incentive for corporations to violate the sovereignty of the band."īad River band chairman Mike Wiggins said in a statement that "tribal sovereignty prevailed over corporate profits" in the decision, but warned that the tribe's fight is still far from over. "Such a small award for a decade-long trespass during which Enbridge earned over a billion dollars in net profits from Line 5 will not sufficiently deter trespassers like Enbridge," Arnold said. The band's fight has never been about money, he added, but Conley's formula for compensating Bad River - a small percentage of the profits from Line 5 based on how much territory the pipeline occupies - will have an undesired effect. "The three-year timeline leaves the Bad River vulnerable to catastrophe, and there is no warrant for allowing Enbridge's trespass to continue for that long," said band lawyer Erick Arnold. Not surprisingly, his middle ground has satisfied neither side. In the opinion released Friday, he found that a rupture of Line 5 on Bad River territory would "unquestionably" meet the definition of a public nuisance under federal law.īut Conley has long been reluctant to order a shutdown, citing reams of expert opinion warning of dire economic consequences, lingering fuel shortages in the Midwest, Ontario and Quebec and a lasting scar on Canada-U.S. Those were the orders issued late last week by district court Judge William Conley, who has been presiding for nearly four years over the Line 5 dispute between Enbridge and the Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Chippewa.Ĭonley had already concluded that Enbridge has been trespassing on the Bad River reservation ever since easements for the pipeline were allowed to lapse in 2013, despite what the company says was a deal in 1992 to keep operating. will do little to discourage other resource companies from violating Indigenous sovereignty. WASHINGTON - Three years is more than enough time for Line 5 to suffer a catastrophic rupture and far too long to make an Indigenous band in Wisconsin wait for the controversial cross-border pipeline to be rerouted, the band's lawyers say.Īnd they further warn that the US$5.1-million profit-sharing penalty imposed on Calgary-based operator Enbridge Inc.
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