The Greene County Board of Supervisors gave an update and held a discussion at their regular meeting on Monday regarding the proposed carbon dioxide underground pipeline.
Supervisor Chair John Muir, County Environmental and Zoning Administrator Chuck Wenthold, County Engineer Wade Weiss and Snyder and Associates Construction Technician Kristina Paradise, and Bolton and Menk met last week to discuss Snyder as the county’s pipeline inspector and Bolton and Menk to handle the district drainage tiles for the project proposed by Summit Carbon Solutions. Muir explained the result of that meeting.
“General drainage issues, after our meeting last Tuesday, I felt we made it very plain to Bolton and Menk and Snyder of our concerns, what we wanted, expected. In the drainage world, I’m comfortable that everybody in that meeting understood our concerns, that it (the district drainage tile) needed to stay uninterrupted.”
Of the over 2,000 miles underground pipeline that is claimed to capture carbon dioxide emissions from 31 ethanol plants across five Midwest states and stored in an underground facility in North Dakota, about 12 miles stretches into Greene County to Louis Dreyfus. Dan and Sue Tronchetti are landowners who are impacted by the project and were concerned about not having liability insurance if Summit determines a leak was caused by them, because their insurance company would only handle it if there was a claim.
Dan also brought up another concern about Summit possibly using eminent domain and forcibly taking their easement. He urged the Supervisors to file opposition to the Iowa Utilities Board to not allow Summit to use eminent domain.
“Twenty-four counties so far have stated that private companies should not receive the power of eminent domain. It scares me to think what Iowa will look like if the Iowa Utilities Board continues to grant eminent domain to private groups.”
Muir said they would consider those concerns moving forward and were expected to approve an agreement for Snyder and Associates to be the county’s inspector.