See Standing Rock Redux. WSJ editorial.

"The proposed Line 3 would replace a deteriorating pipeline built in the 1960s that moves Alberta crude oil through a sliver of North Dakota and across Minnesota to Wisconsin. Enbridge estimates the old pipeline would require some 900 repairs by 2025 and 6,000 over the next 15 years, and it’s operating at about half capacity due to safety concerns.

The new Line 3 would benefit from more than 50 years of pipeline innovation. The old pipeline was forged using flash welding, which introduces impurities into steel that can cause cracks and corrosion.

Today’s double-submerged arc welding keeps pipeline steel clean and strong. To prevent rust, the new Line 3 would be coated in fusion-bonded epoxy. That’s a big improvement over the polyethelyne tape twisted around the old pipeline like hockey-stick wrap. The new pipeline would also feature automated valves, sophisticated leak-detection systems and 24/7 monitoring.

Thanks to such technological advances, pipelines now deliver oil safely 99.999% of the time, according to a 2017 report by the Association of Oil Pipelines and the American Petroleum Institute. Last year 72% of spills occurred in contained units on the operators’ property. And 70% of pipeline spills are less than a cubic meter, says Canada’s Fraser Institute."

"Trucks and trains are the alternatives to pipelines, but they’re more dangerous and carbon-intensive. Between 16.5 million and 23.1 million gallons of Bakken crude pass through Minnesota by rail each day. The state’s Department of Transportation has warned that this heavy train traffic routinely delays emergency-response vehicles and “poses a threat of catastrophic fire in the event of a derailment and rupture of some of the tank cars.” A recent derailment 15 miles south of the Minnesota border spilled 230,000 gallons of oil, contaminating two rivers."