Earlier this week, Bluestem posted MNHouse Majority Leader Long, committee chairs Frentz, Stephenson got late, large contributions from ethanol pipeline execs.
Those ethanol executives are connected with the proposed carbon sequestration pipeline by Navigator CO2,
What's the issue with the pipeline? (The campaign contributions by out-of-state business executives evoke other questions about buying access to legislators).
At the Mitchell Republic, Jason Harward reports in Public not sold on Navigator pipeline despite attempts to build landowner trust:
At each of a trio of public input meetings last week regarding the proposed carbon sequestration pipeline by Navigator CO2, one attendee asked the crowd to raise their hand if they were in favor of moving ahead with the project.
And, between the three meetings held in Canton, Flandreau and Sioux Falls on Nov. 21 and 22, only a handful were in favor out of the more than 400 total attendees.
Elizabeth Burns-Thompson, the vice president of government and public affairs with Navigator CO2, who led presentations and answered questions at all three meetings, said it was an important part of building a partnership with the owners of land in the proposed pipeline route.
“There is a lot of value in the big informational meetings that we did with the PUC,” Burns-Thompson said. “I think the greatest value comes in being able to sit down one on one with landowners and have them see that we are there to listen.”
Filing paperwork with the Public Utilities Commission on Sept. 27, Navigator is the second player in what could become a gold rush for sequestering excess carbon from ethanol plants around the Midwest in exchange for billions in federal tax credits.
Unlike the proposal by Summit Carbon Solutions, which goes through a large swath of eastern South Dakota and deposits carbon in North Dakota, the Navigator pipeline’s footprint in South Dakota currently encompasses just over 100 miles through five counties in the southeast portion of the state. Burns-Thompson said the project is planning to expand to other POET locations in Mitchell, Groton and Big Stone City.
The majority of the 1,300 miles of proposed pipeline travels through Iowa and will deposit carbon in Illinois. . . .
. . .
But the main thrust of opposition relates to safety. Donald Johnson, the fire chief in Valley Springs, said at the Sioux Falls meeting that the largely volunteer emergency services in rural areas of the pipeline route do not have the gear to effectively respond to a potential carbon leak, which could cause asphyxiation.
Burns-Thompson emphasized to Forum News Service that the Navigator pipeline would put safety first, adding that pipelines are the “safest means” of transporting liquified carbon.
The opposition points to an incident in Mississippi in 2020 in which a carbon pipeline leaked and put dozens of people in the hospital. The federal body in charge of these pipelines is still in a rulemaking process regarding how to make them safer.
Johnson warned that the colorless, odorless carbon gas could travel to population centers even if the leak occurs in a rural area.
“If this thing leaks, carbon is heavier than air, so it's going to stay on the ground,” Johnson said at the Nov. 22 meeting in Sioux Falls. “And it's called Valley Springs for a reason. There's a valley. That gas is going to lay in the valley and float down to Brandon and Sioux Falls.” ...
Read the rest at the Mitchell Republic.
Related posts
Related posts
- In Iowa, ethanol carbon pipeline opponents want pause until new safety regulations are ready
- Summit Carbon Solutions files permit for risky CO2 pipeline in Otter Tail and Wilkin Counties
- Will ethanol carbon capture pipelines fracture brittle unity of South Dakota Republicans?
- South Dakotans & others get fantods over Summit Carbon Solutions' sketchy 10% owner
- Matt Birk loves the ethanol carbon dioxide pipeline proposed by Summit Carbon Solutions
- Ethanol carbon pipeline news digest: from the Guardian to the Aberdeen American News
- Navigator CO2, POET sign letter of intent for carbon capture, utilization, and storage service
- Carbon capture pipeline blues: SD landowners call for dismissal of pipeline permit application
- Iowa Capital Dispatch: Group seeks end of ethanol carbon pipeline ‘harassment’
- Ethanol carbon capture pipeline digest: farmers, students, greenwashing, safety, law enforcement
- Storm Lake Time Pilot's Art Cullen: Ripping up CRP is a terrible signal for the planet
- Minnesota Public Utility Commission claims regulatory authority for carbon pipelines
- CO2 pipelines could affect the land, lives and livelihoods of South Dakota property owners
- SD News Watch: Proposed CO2 pipelines thrust SD into billion-dollar climate change debate
- About that permanent carbon storage by the Summit ethanol pipeline & Project Tundra
- Ethanol carbon capture pipeline news digest: political power and big money edition
- Ethanol carbon pipeline digest: trust & protest
- South Dakotans, Iowans don't hug CO2 pipeline
- Keloland: mostly negative public comments to SD Public Utilities Commission on CO2 pipeline
- Strib: Ethanol's per-gallon carbon output shrinks, but greenhouse gas from plants remains high
- We agree: It's time to move on from ethanol
- Another IA newspaper editorial board questions ethanol industry, carbon capture pipelines
- Ethanol CCS pipeline update: Reuters & Agweek
- Not a lot of easements for Midwest carbon pipeline, but plenty of political connections
- 2 ethanol CO2 headlines that make us go hmmm
- CO2 pipelines: who wins & who loses?
- Coming soon from a cornfield near you: mammoth carbon capture pipeline system
- Mother Jones: USDA Secretary Vilsack’s son works for a controversial ethanol pipeline project
- Iowa county boards scorn construction of CO2 pipelines, use of eminent domain to build them
- Digest of news about carbon dioxide pipeline
Photo: A POET ethanol plant. From the locations page on the firm's website,
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