Tagged: enbridge

Gasoline prices in parts of Michigan are soaring over $4 a gallon.

The recent leak that shutdown an oil pipeline in Wisconsin is getting much of the blame. The Enbridge Energy pipeline has been shut down since it sprung a leak last week.

Enbridge Energy is facing new questions from federal regulators. 

Those questions come after another one of the company’s pipelines in Wisconsin sprung a leak.

It's been two years since a busted pipeline spilled more than 800,000 gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River.

Michigan Radio's  Zoe Clark sat down with reporter Steve Carmody who has covered the spill since July 2010 and spoke about the efforts to clean up with river and how its faring two years on.

This Wednesday marks the second anniversary of the Kalamazoo River oil spill.

A national environmental group is releasing a report today attacking the company whose pipeline broke.

Federal regulators this week blasted Enbridge Energy for its handling of the 2010 Kalamazoo River oil spill.     But the highly critical federal report is unlikely to affect a state review of Enbridge’s plans for a new oil pipeline through Michigan.  

The National Transportation Safety Board is not pulling its punches against Enbridge Energy in a highly critical report of the company’s handling of the July, 2010 oil spill near Marshall.

Federal regulators will release a report tomorrow on the reasons why an oil pipeline broke near Marshall.

Environmentalists want to see if problems with federal oversight of the pipeline industry will be cited in the report.

Republican Congressman Fred Upton and his primary challenger Jack Hoogendyk talked mostly about health care the federal deficit and energy issues during a debate Tuesday afternoon. The two Republicans debated for an hour on WKZO.

Their talking points were about the same but Hoogendyk says he’s more conservative than Upton, who’s been in Congress 25 years now.

Enbridge may face record penalty for 2010 spill

Enbridge Energy is responsible for the pipeline rupture that spilled more than 843,000 gallons of tar sands oil into the Kalamazoo River and Talmadge Creek near Marshall, MI.  EPA estimates that number is more than 1 million gallons.  Steve Carmody reports the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration  (PHMSA) has spent the past few years reviewing the events that led up to the oil spill.  

PHMSA’s investigation found multiple violations of its hazardous liquid pipeline safety regulations related to integrity management, failure to follow operations and maintenance procedures, and reporting and operator qualification requirements. PHMSA issued its notice and proposed civil penalty to Enbridge in a Notice of Probable Violation. The agency is proposing a fine for Enbridge of $3.7 million, which would be a record civil penalty. Enbridge has said the company expects to spend $700 million cleaning up the spill.

Michigan to receive $23.8 million from settlement of drug marketing case

Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette says the state is in line to get $23.8 million as part of a $3 billion settlement of an improper drug marketing case against GlaxoSmithKline LLC, the Associated Press reports. From the AP:

The U.S. Justice Department said Monday that the British pharmaceutical giant agreed to the payment and is pleading guilty to promoting two popular drugs for unapproved uses. The federal government says the company also admits failing to disclose important safety information on a third drug. Michigan was among states that sued the company. Schuette says GlaxoSmithKline underpaid the rebates in owed for drugs paid through Michigan's Medicaid program. The Justice Department says the $3 billion combined criminal-civil fine will be the largest penalty ever paid by a drug company.

June auto sales 

Analysts say U.S. auto sales continued to buck the otherwise poor economic news in June. Tracy Samilton reports:

Larry Dominique of True Car Dot Com says June car sales should be up about 18% from last June.    That's a pretty healthy increase given worries about the recession in Europe and the barely moving unemployment numbers in the U.S. 

Dominique says he will be interested to see what kind of cars people bought toward the end of June -- when gas prices went down noticeably. 

"Typical of Americans we tend to have short memories, so as fuel prices go down we tend to go towards larger displacements and trucks."

Dominique says Honda and Toyota had especially good sales in June.  He says the two companies have largely recovered from the tsunami last spring.

Enbridge Energy may have to pay a record federal fine for the July 2010 oil spill near Marshall.

But the proposed fine is well below the expected cost of the nearly two-year-long cleanup.