Oil is flowing towards Lake Michigan via the Kalamazoo River this evening.  A crude oil pipeline run by Enbridge Energy Partners LP sprung a leak near a pumping station in Marshall, Michigan yesterday morning.  The pipeline has been shut down as crews scurry to clean up 19,500 barrels of crude oil (that’s 819,000 gallons).

 This is the second pipeline oil spill this summer.  There was also a spill in Utah, not to mention the massive spill in the Gulf.  All of this as TransCanada is pushing to build a pipeline that will pump tar sands oil from Alberta Canada to Texas over the Ogallala Aquifer.

TransCanada’s environmental toxicologist, Heidi Tillquist, has said the chance of a pipeline leaking is once every 7,400 years per mile of pipeline.  With the rash of oil spills this summer, this seems like more than a conservative estimate.  Nor are they any comfort to the people living along Red Butte Creak in Utah, the Kalamazoo River in Michigan, and Nebraska farmers in the Sandhills.

Action:

 Help protect Nebraska’s natural resources from oil spills.  Sign the petition to stop the Keystone XL pipeline.