Editor’s note: This is part one of a two-part series. Part two is planned to run in the Tuesday, May 6, Waverly Newspaper.

Surveying in the greater Bremer County area is ongoing for phase two of the liquefied carbon dioxide pipeline, the part Summit Carbon Solutions took over from Navigator CO2 Ventures.

Bremer County Supervisor Corey Cerwinske recapped the situation after a Sierra Club organizer presented on Sunday, April 27, at the Wapsie Valley Elementary in Readlyn.

Briefly, Sierra Club organizer Jess Mazour recapped the reasons people might not want the pipeline: Pipelines can damage cropland. CO2 is dangerous at high concentrations such as in a hazardous liquid pipeline. Carbon capture and storage takes a lot of water.

The most frequently echoed sticking point, which Mazour introduced, is eminent domain for private gain. Taking land without the owner’s consent by eminent domain is usually conditioned on the resource in the pipeline being a public utility – which CO2 is not.

The pipeline is eligible for tax credits for carbon capture and storage – under IRS Code 45Q and 45Z.

“The real reason Summit wants these pipelines to be built is so they can capture, not just CO2, but capture our tax dollars through tax credits. It’s the 45Q and 45Z tax credit. Summit wants to get paid for capturing the CO2, and put it underground,” Mazour said.

“The fact (is) that we’re paying for it. They could make upwards of $30 billion dollars in our tax credits for this project alone,” Mazour asserted. “This tax credit pays per ton of CO2 captured. They get $85 a ton if they do sequestration where they put the CO2 underground. They get $60 a ton for enhanced oil recovery when they put it into depleted oil fields and pump more out.

“We are literally going to pay more than their upfront infrastructure costs for them to do this,” Mazour contended.

Since Iowa is still allowing eminent domain for the carbon pipeline, the project amounts to eminent domain for private gain, Mazour said.

Summit case status with IUC

The Iowa Utilities Commission granted conditional approval to Summit Carbon Solutions’ pipeline project, on the condition that it also will have to pass in North Dakota and South Dakota to go on in Iowa.

The process has stalled in South Dakota after that state’s legislature passed a law banning the use of eminent domain for carbon pipelines.

Meanwhile four main parties are appealing the approval of phase one, according to Mazour: The Sierra Club; a group of landowners working with attorney Brian Jorde with Domina Law; the Republican Legislative Intervenors for Justice (RLIJ) and a group of counties that have teamed up and all hired attorneys, including Bremer County.

The RLIJ group includes Sen. Sandy Salmon of Janesville and Rep. Charley Thompson of Charles City, who spoke after Mazour’s presentation.

Salmon credited IUC Commissioner Josh Byrnes for adding the condition that North and South Dakota had to pass the Summit cases in their states before it could go through in Iowa. She said he had to vote for the motion to get the other commissioners to approve those conditions.

Cerwinske on surveying

Bremer County Supervisor Corey Cerwinske said survey action has been going on for over three weeks in the county, which is part of phase two, the former Navigator project.

“When they come in for a condemnation survey like they’re doing for this pipeline(...), what you can do if you don’t want them on your land is just, simply ask them to leave. As Jess (Mazour) said, ‘Don’t come back without a court-ordered injunction.’ Force them to seek that injunction.”

“(The injunction) will give you the same due process that we were trying to do through the (county) ordinance, is better notification.(...) So this way the sheriff’s office would intervene because of the injunction.

“We can’t stop the surveys, it’s spelled out in 479B.15 (of Iowa Code) that it is not a trespass, unfortunately,” Cerwinske said. “Every other test of trespassing, it fails at, except for the fact that it is codified in 479B.15 that it is not. We have to accept that it is not a trespass and (...) restrict it through court-ordered injunctions.”

Cerwinske said his No. 1 phone call from constituents recently is how to handle the surveyors.

If surveyors are bold and won’t leave the property, Cerwinske said, “That’s the point to engage law enforcement. Ask the sheriff’s office to intervene and escort them off the property and (tell them) that they do need an injunction to enter that property,” Cerwinske said.

Cerwinske encouraged people who have an issue on their property with surveyors to file a complaint or document the issue in the related Summit case with the IUC.

He also echoed Mazour’s comments about Summit’s Exhibit H filing of the status of easements along the pipeline corridor.

“Just recently we filed a motion to resist a Summit filing with the IUC on April 4. They are seeking an extension of their deadline to file final Exhibit Hs for phase two projects. (
) To extend that deadline is not fair for the landowners.”

Regarding the Exhibit H maps, Cerwinske added, “In the last week, I’ve been reaching out to landowners I know across the county that were affected. I’ve identified nine parcels that weren’t listed in the filings since Thursday, just in Bremer County (and) eight parcels in Butler County that are not identified.”

According to Mazour, there are over 800 unsigned easements along Summit’s initial, phase one route in Iowa alone.

No one that spoke during the meeting identified themselves as from Summit. More than 50 people signed in.

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