Several people spoke at the Iowa Utilities Commission meeting this week about the proposed changes submitted for the Summit Carbon Solutions carbon pipeline project.
Steve Kuiper is a farmer and vice president on the Iowa Corn Growers Association Board, and said approving the pipeline request is important economically. “This request will be a tremendous help to Iowa’s corn farmers. Currently, the state of the Iowa farming economy has got some serious financial difficulties ahead,” he said. He says it will help bolster the price of Iowa’s corn by 20 to 30 cents. And Kuiper said the construction of the pipeline will bring in a lot jobs while it is built.
Colleen Tucker is a fifth generation landowner from Mitchell County. “This past week, the company announced it would withdraw its CO2 pipeline from eight counties in Iowa and scale back the route in four additional counties. While this is welcome news for more than 400 landowners, there are many more landowners that are still waiting for relief. The question is, when will those landowners finally see an end to this nightmare that has been dragged on since 2021?,” she said.
The changes would pull the pipeline out of Adams, Fremont, Mitchell, Montgomery, Page, Pottawattamie, Shelby and Worth Counties. And the pipeline route would be reduced in Crawford, Dickinson, Floyd and Sioux Counties, impacting about 400 landowners. Tucker said there have been too many changes and she asked the Commission to end the pipeline. “Many landowners were originally told one thing at the beginning, only to watch the project evolve over time into something totally different than what was initially presented,” she said. “To me, that sounds like broken promises, and that alone should be enough to revoke the company’s permit.”
Other landowners also spoke out and ask the IUC to no allow eminent domain to be used to seize land for the pipeling, or asked that they Commission deny the permit. A representing of a union for construction workers told the Commission the pipeline would create a lot of jobs and asked them to approve the changes. The speakers talked during the public comment period at the end of the meeting, and IUC members do not respond or ask questions during that portion of the meeting.