How much ‘net’ CO2 would pipelines remove?

CEDAR RAPIDS — A 2,000-mile carbon dioxide pipeline proposed for northern and western Iowa would have the capacity to store CO2 equal to emissions from 3.9 million automobiles — more than the number registered in Iowa in 2020.

But skeptics say you have to factor in emissions from building and maintaining the pipelines as well as from growing corn to make ethanol — the primary industry supplying CO2 for the pipelines.

“So while you’re putting 10 million metric tons underground, you’re emitting one to two (million metric tons) from operations and so you have to do the net, right?” said Charles Stanier, a University of Iowa engineering professor who served on Iowa’s Carbon Sequestration Task Force.

Stanier was joined by John Satterfield, Summit’s director of regulatory affairs, and Bill Caram, executive director of the Pipeline Safety Trust, for a panel discussion this week titled “Carbon dioxide pipelines: Do they have a public benefit?”

The hourlong virtual panel was part of The Gazette’s Iowa Ideas Conference.

Summit is one of three companies that want to build pipelines across Iowa to gather CO2 from ethanol plants, transport the liquefied gas and inject it into porous rock thousands of feet underground. The goal is to reduce atmospheric greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.

Summit’s $4.5 billion proposed pipeline would cross five states, connecting with more than 30 ethanol plants, including 12 in Iowa.

“Ethanol plants are the low-hanging fruit from a CO2 source perspective,” Satterfield said Thursday.

Other potential customers could be fertilizer plants or plants that make renewable aviation fuels, he said. If Iowa gets into hydrogen production, CO2 also would be a byproduct of that process.

Because carbon sequestration still is relatively new, with less than 1 percent of all U.S. underground pipelines transporting CO2, the government needs to catch up with regulations to make sure pipelines are safe, said Caram, whose Washington state group advocates for pipeline safety.

“There are no regulations for corrosive or toxic impurities in the pipeline,” Caram said. “There’s no requirement for an odorant. So people might not know there’s been a CO2 pipeline rupture as they’re getting asphyxiated.”

A 2021 explosion of a CO2 pipeline in Satartia, Miss., sent dozens of people to the hospital as carbon dioxide robbed the air of oxygen.

Summit has reviewed the federal findings about the blast, which Satterfield said was caused because the pipeline was built running perpendicular on a slope. When heavy rain washed out soil around the pipeline, the tube split.

“There are lots of lessons learned there we’ve taken into account with our design and our project,” he said. “That should never of happened.”

Summit now is meeting with emergency responders on the proposed pipeline route to talk about the project and what types of equipment or training crews might need in case of a leak or explosion.

As part of the permitting process, state regulators can require companies to get insurance for these types of emergencies, the Pipeline Safety Trust reported.

Comments: (319) 339-3157; erin.jordan@thegazette.com