Residents organize meeting to learn about CO2 pipeline

A carbon pipeline company looking to take carbon emissions from ethanol plants and pipe liquid carbon through multiple states, including South Dakota, has prompted local landowners to organize a meeting. The informative meeting begins at 1 p.m. Saturday, March 5 at the American Legion Hall in Valley Springs.

Heartland Greenway, LLC, has proposed to build a CO2 pipeline that could potentially affect the communities of Brandon, Valley Springs, Garretson and the surrounding area. Landowners and community members who are opposed to the pipeline for the health of the community, land and future development, are encouraged to attend.

Chase Jensen, community organizer and lobbyist with Dakota Rural Action, will update the public on the Summit Midwest Carbon Express pipeline project that’s currently before the state Public Utilities Commission. He will also discuss landowner rights in relation to eminent domain.

Heartland Greenway, a Navigator CO2 Ventures company, has proposed building a carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) system that will provide biofuel producers and other industrial customers in five Midwest states with a long-term and cost-effective means to reduce their carbon footprint. The pipeline would service industrial customers in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota. Operations are expected to be phased in early 2025.

The multi-faceted project will help customers finance and construct their carbon dioxide (CO2) capture equipment; safely transport the captured CO2 over a newly built 1,300-mile pipeline network; and permanently sequester 10-15 million metric tons of CO2 into a safe and secure, underground sequestration site. Navigator’s project is one of the first large-scale, commercially viable CCS projects to be developed in the United States.

Once fully expanded, Heartland Greenway will have the ability to capture and store 15 million metric tons of CO2 every year. That is equivalent annually to the emissions from approximately 3.2 million cars driven, CO2 sequestered by 18.3 million acres of U.S. forest, or eliminating the carbon footprint of the Des Moines metro area three times over.

Heartland Greenway isn’t the only CO2 pipeline that’s being proposed. Summit Carbon Solutions is led by Bruce Rastetter, an Iowa agribusiness leader who has owned and operated pork and ethanol companies in the state. Summit’s Midwest Carbon Express pipeline, estimated to cost $4.5 billion, plans to run through Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota and sink carbon dioxide into a geological formation in North Dakota about a mile into the ground.

The company, based in Ames, Iowa, filed in early February for a permit with the South Dakota PUC for nearly 459 miles of planned pipeline routes. The approval process for this permit takes about a year and includes opportunities for public comment. And if necessitated, Summit officials have said they would be able to use eminent domain. 

In South Dakota, the project would take carbon dioxide emitted by ethanol plants. Carbon dioxide is a gas but it would be liquified to travel through the pipes. It would flow through the state before getting pumped into the ground in North Dakota. According to the Summit website, the goal of the project is to reduce carbon emissions from ethanol plants and enhance the long-term profitability of the ethanol industry.

Potential issues of a pipeline

According to a HuffPost article by Dan Zegart, a 2020 carbon dioxide pipeline ruptured in Satartia, Miss. About two dozen people collapsed within minutes, and because cars need oxygen to burn fuel, people were unable to drive away from the gas, Zegart reported.

Similar to Summit’s proposed pipeline, the carbon dioxide flowing through the pipes was liquid. But it was contaminated with hydrogen sulfide, which gave the carbon dioxide a green. color and rotten eggs smell. Hydrogen sulfide is a deadly gas.

As stated by Summit CEO Jimmy Powell, the company’s proposed project does not include hydrogen sulfide.

Some symptoms of exposure to high carbon dioxide concentrations include: convulsions, asphyxia and coma, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Carbon dioxide is also a colorless and odorless gas. And because the pipeline will only be 4 feet underground, some landowners are concerned about rupturing it, even if that’s 20 years from now. 

Landowners have also raised questions about the company’s integrity. Summit Carbon Solutions is currently proposing easements, although it does not yet have a permit to begin construction of the pipelines. If easements are not signed, Powell said on Tuesday that he’s confident the company will get a right to eminent domain. 

District 23 Rep. Spencer Gosch, R-Glenham, stated at a Jan. 29 Legislative Cracker Barrel in Aberdeen, that he’s researching the state’s eminent domain regulations, but didn’t expect to propose a bill on that topic in this session. He pledged to continue to review the topic for future legislation though.

Rep. Charlie Hoffman (R-Eureka) says Summit Carbon Solution’s proposed pipeline is vital to ethanol and the future of farming.

“When considering the future of agriculture and what is needed to ensure our industry thrives for generations to come, I am thrilled to see such innovation here at home,” Hoffman said. “I am also confident in Summit Carbon Solutions, a Midwest-based company, to carry out the successful installation and operation of this ever-important project. Facts do matter as I have personally witnessed untruths being spread by certain groups on the scientific scope of this operation. I ask only that both sides are fairly represented.”

In January, Navigator CO2 held 55 public meetings to educated residents in the communities who may be affected. Elizabeth Burns-Thompson, vice president of government and public affairs for Navigator, said every state does not require local informational meetings, but they felt it was beneficial to open the lines of communication.

“We think it’s just good practice to make outreach pretty uniform across the footprint of the project as a whole,” she said. 

Burns-Thompson said Navigator recognizes that carbon capture and storage is new to the Midwest, but it’s been a successful process in other parts of the country.

“We get a lot of questions about the process – ow it works and how do we know that it works,” she said.