Landowners ask court to reconsider decision to pause Iowa pipeline permit lawsuit

Landowners opposed to a carbon sequestration project in Iowa have asked a state court to reconsider its decision to pause a lawsuit over the permit for the pipeline until state officials rule on a filed amendment.

Landowners argue the Polk County District Court’s decision to send the permit back to the Iowa Utilities Commission “relied heavily” on the existence of a South Dakota law prohibiting the use of eminent domain for carbon sequestration pipelines.

Landowners, counties and the Sierra Club Iowa Chapter filed a suit in 2024 against the Iowa Utilities Commission decision to grant a permit to Summit Carbon Solutions for the first phase of its proposed carbon sequestration pipeline. The permit stated the Iowa-based company could not begin construction on the pipeline to connect to biorefineries and transport carbon dioxide to underground storage in North Dakota, until it had secured permits from the Dakotas.

In the spring of 2025, however, South Dakota enacted a law that prohibited the use of eminent domain for carbon sequestration pipelines. Eminent domain is used to force unwilling landowners to allow the use of their property for projects considered in the public interest, at a price set by a county commission. South Dakota’s law meant Summit would have to obtain 100 percent of necessary land easements through voluntary contracts.

Summit filed for an amendment to its permit in September with the IUC to replace the Dakotas-specific language and instead require that the company receive permits for adequate sequestration and storage sites, not in a specific location.

The company then requested the court pause proceedings on the case against the permit until the IUC ruled on the proposed amendments. After oral arguments on the request in October, the Iowa District Court for Polk County remanded the permit to the IUC and paused judicial proceedings until the commission decided on the proposed amendments.

The changes in South Dakota, which occurred after the IUC issued the initial permit, were influential to the court’s decision.

Polk County District Court Judge Scott Beattie referred to the law as the “S.D. CO2 Pipeline Ban” in the decision and said it “render the IUC’s Final Order void” and would require Summit to find a route outside of South Dakota to get to its planned underground storage site in North Dakota.

Landowners requesting the reconsideration of the case said the South Dakota law is “not a ban” on carbon dioxide pipelines in the state and that the law should not be a “relevant or material factor” in the case as Summit could still pass through South Dakota under the law.

“(The South Dakota law) is not a ban on Summit’s project in South Dakota and is not a ban on the citing and construction of carbon oxide pipelines in, through, or across South Dakota, that change in law is not material to the IUC’s South Dakota condition,” the motion for reconsideration said.

The motion from landowners argues that because Summit has not stated that it no longer plans to route the pipeline through South Dakota, the remand to the IUC gives the company a “second bite at the apple” and a “business flexibility” which leaves affected landowners “in the lurch.”

“Summit wants the South Dakota condition removed while still maintaining the right to send Iowa carbon dioxide through South Dakota,” the motion said. “… unless Summit presented evidence to this court renouncing any South Dakota route through which Iowa generated CO2 would travel via its pipeline, the logic for the IUC condition remains and remand is not necessary because Summit can and may go through South Dakota.”

Representation for Summit argued before the court that it made “little sense” to proceed with the case if the permit were to be amended at the IUC level.

Judge Beattie also noted that staying the case until the IUC decided on the permit amendment would also prevent the case from potentially being litigated a second time. Beattie wrote in the decision that “adjudicating the merits of a permit that is actively being amended serves no useful purpose.”

Summit Carbon Solutions did not respond to a request for comment.

The landowners, represented by Brian Jorde of Domina Law Group, asked the court to reverse its finding that the South Dakota law renders the IUC order void and to reverse its remand to instead set a briefing schedule for the appeal.

If the court does not reverse its decision, the motion asks the court to “specifically identify” and direct the IUC to “rescind route approval and eminent domain approval for all portions of the Iowa route from the South Dakota border back to the nearest connecting Iowa ethanol plant” in order to avoid “pipelines to nowhere.”

This article was first published by Iowa Capital Dispatch.