BY TINA LAM
FREE PRESS

The pipeline that leaked as much as 1 million gallons of crude oil into the Kalamazoo River near Marshall has other weak spots even closer to the Great Lakes, U.S. Rep. Candice Miller said today.

In June 2009, Enbridge’s own assessment of the pipeline 6B, which runs through Michigan on its way to deliver crude oil from Indiana to a refinery at Sarnia, found more than 200 anomalies between mileposts 650 and 753, even closer to the Great Lakes than the spill near Marshall, which was at milepost 608. While Enbridge reduced the maximum pressure of the pipeline in the area with anomalies, the company has not yet made necessary repairs, Miller said.

“There is great deal of evidence indicating problems with the Line 6B other than where the rupture occurred,” Miller said in a statement earlier today. “While we were fortunate the spill of July 26th did not reach the Great Lakes, we would likely not be so fortunate should the pipeline rupture in sensitive areas near Lake St. Clair or even under the St. Clair River which provides the drinking water for millions of our citizens.” She called on the federal agency that regulates oil pipelines to immediately inspect the entire 6B pipeline.

“The events in the Gulf of Mexico have demonstrated how quickly devastation can occur if we are not proactive in preventing spills in the first place, and so we must make every effort to make certain this does not happen again,” Miller said. Congress needs to hold hearings to investigate the cause of the incident and come up with new policies to prevent future spills.

In addition to the gulf oil spill, “I believe the Enbridge spill can be the catalyst that results in a safer pipeline system in our country,” Miller said.