Resistance to Pipeline Bigger than Keystone Thwarts Enbridge in Wisconsin

Pipeline giant Enbridge, Inc., is in a standoff with a Wisconsin zoning committee over the company's plans to vastly increase the amount of tar sands oil pumped through one of its lines.

In an usual move, the Dane County Zoning and Land Regulation Committee slapped additional insurance requirements on Enbridge before letting it build a new high-capacity pump station along its Line 61.

Boosting pumping power is critical to Enbridge's plan to triple the capacity of the six-year-old pipeline that runs from northern Wisconsin to refineries near Chicago.  Adding the insurance is one of few precautions the county can take to prepare for a potential spill on the expanded line.

At its new capacity Line 61 would carry 1.2 million barrels of heavy crude oil from Canada's tar sands region a day—more oil than the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which has inspired fierce public opposition and debate for seven years.

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