EPA and Enbridge Still Covering-up Lax Clean-up Efforts?

By
Gabriel Caplett
– 11/08/2010

Michigan Messenger is reporting that the EPA and Enbridge continue to ignore whistleblower warnings and video evidence that much oil remains in the Kalamazoo River, after a late July spill:

Enbridge officials acknowledge that the oil is not completely gone, and that work on the river will continue until the weather prohibits any more clean up. They say it will pick back up in the spring.

But Bolenbaugh says that while he was working on the river, officials directed workers to leave oil contamination at various locations along the river. He was fired from the cleanup, he says, because he blew the whistle on contractors and Enbridge over the allegations that the groups were involved in hiding oil, rather than removing it as they were being paid to do.

Michigan Messenger reported similar allegations in September when a whistleblower provided Messenger with first hand accounts and photos of oil on islands dotting the 37 miles of the Kalamazoo River and on the banks. Enbridge and EPA officials denied the allegations at the time.

This post was written by

Gabriel Caplett – who has written 106 posts on Headwaters - Community Journalism for the Great Lakes.

Gabriel Caplett is a writer and market farmer from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

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