Iowa Carbon Pipeline Resistance

It was predictable that ridiculous schemes would appear now that the public can no longer ignore environmental chaos beginning to occur in so many, increasingly devastating ways. Learning the cause of these climate catastrophes is greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels, the public is desperately calling for ways to reduce those emissions now.

The common theme is the demand to reduce emissions without affecting their lifestyles that are dependent upon energy that is produced by burning fossil fuels.

That is impossible. Not nearly enough renewable energy capacity could be built to meet the demand.

The idea of sucking carbon dioxide from the atmosphere sounds good, but it is not. The amount of carbon dioxide that could be removed this way is miniscule. And to deal with even that small amount would involve unproven and dangerous technology. Pipelines would be required to transport the carbon hundreds of miles in most cases, to places where it would be pumped into underground rock formations. And no one knows how long it would be before the carbon begins to leak out of those formations.

As with the Keystone XL, Dakota Access and other pipelines, significant environmental damages would occur if the carbon pipelines were built. Eminent Domain would be used to force farmers to allow construction of pipelines through their fertile lands.

These pipelines have the added danger of harming or killing people and animals if they leak. This occurred in Satartia, Mississippi, in 2020. See Carbon Pipeline Opposition.


At Summit Carbon headquarters

Kathy Stockdale says she has the unlucky distinction of having two of three planned carbon capture pipelines across Iowa proposing to run through the 550-acre Hardin County farm her family has owned for a century.

Summit Carbon Solutions’ $4.5 billion project would run between her and her son, Kurtis’, homes, while Navigator CO2 Ventures’ $3 billion pipeline would cut across a nearby field.

“This land is part of us. We’ve worked hard to make improvements,” said Stockdale, 71, adding that she feels “like my property rights are being taken away.” 

Stockdale was among about 100 Iowans Tuesday who joined what was billed as a “people’s public hearing” at the Iowa Capitol. They called on lawmakers to impose stronger restrictions on the pipeline developers’ use of eminent domain to force unwilling landowners to sell access to their property for their projects.

Iowans at Capitol push for stronger restrictions on eminent domain for carbon capture pipelines by Donnelle Eller, Des Moines Register, March 29, 2022

Iowa Carbon Pipeline Resistance Coalition

Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is not the answer to the climate emergency. CCS is unproven, dangerous and delays real solutions to the climate crisis such as energy conservation, regenerative agriculture and renewable energy.

Join us in standing against private corporations for private gain and corrupt governments in Iowa as these pipelines are headed to tribal lands in Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota, following the DAPL easement.

Organizations and landowners were at the Iowa State Capitol rotunda yesterday (3:30-6:00) to let our legislators know that Iowans won’t stand for the abuse of eminent domain!

With only a few short weeks left in the legislative session, we need to show our legislators how crucial it is that they take meaningful action right now.

We will hear from experts, landowners, impacted Iowans, Indigenous folks, and legislators as they address concerns about Iowa’s three proposed carbon pipelines—Summit, Navigator, and Wolf.

This event is hosted by Iowa Sierra Club, Science and Environmental Health Network, Iowa Food and Water Watch, and Great Plains Action Society—who are all a part of the Iowa Carbon Pipeline Resistance Coalition.

The Iowa Carbon Pipeline Resistance Coalition
https://www.facebook.com/NoCCSIowa/

Another Des Moines Register article about carbon pipelines: https://quakersandreligioussocialism.com/2022/02/22/carbon-pipeline-opposition/

One thought on “Iowa Carbon Pipeline Resistance

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s