PORTLAND, Maine — Crude oil is no longer flowing through the Portland Pipeline. According to state data, the flow dropped to zero in January and there were no tanker deliveries for the pipeline in February.
Industry analysts say the 236-mile-long pipeline was built to provide for the safe transport of crude oil to Quebec at a time when German U-boats that could sink oil tankers were patrolling the western Atlantic, but it has been shut down and mothballed. The pipeline travels through Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont.
The amount of oil flowing through the pipeline has been dwindling for years, and the completion last fall of major pipeline reversal project in Canada has left the pipeline without a purpose. The refineries in Quebec now get their oil from the vast oil sands reserves in Alberta.