Revised public meetings approved for Wolf Carbon Solutions pipeline proposal

The Iowa Utilities Board on Thursday approved six informational meetings within five counties to discuss the proposal for a carbon capture pipeline that would stretch across eastern Iowa.

The meetings start in Johnson County on Aug. 29 and will follow in Cedar, Linn, Clinton and Scott counties through Aug. 31. A virtual meeting will take place on Sept. 19.

ADM and Wolf Carbon Solutions, an energy infrastructure company based in Alberta, Canada, announced in January their intent to build the 350-mile pipeline – of which approximately 90 miles would go through Iowa counties, according to Wolf.

If completed, it would transport liquified carbon dioxide from ethanol and cogeneration facilities in Cedar Rapids and Clinton to ADM’s existing sequestration site in Decatur, Ill. The pipeline would be owned, operated and maintained by Wolf. It marks the third proposed CO2 pipeline for Iowa.

Wolf Carbon Solutions filed its initial request for the informational meetings to the Iowa Utilities Board on June 27, in which it proposed meetings from Sept. 13 to Sept. 15.

The company has since revised its request twice – on July 8 and July 11 – and moved its in-person meetings two weeks earlier. It also pushed the virtual meeting from Sept. 15 to Sept. 19.

Wolf has also submitted several supporting materials to the Iowa Utilities Board, including a general map of the pipeline’s proposed path through Iowa as well as more specific maps showing its route through Cedar, Johnson, Linn, Clinton and Scott counties.

Other submitted documents include a handout with an overview of the pipeline project and a statement of damage claims that outlines how the company would compensate landowners for property damages during the pipeline’s construction.

Since Wolf’s initial June 27 request for informational meetings, more than 100 objections have been submitted to the Iowa Utilities Board.

The Johnson County Board of Supervisors submitted a letter to the Board on Thursday in opposition to the use of eminent domain.

“Johnson County strives to enhance the quality of life for the people in our community,” the letter read. “The pipeline that is proposed to run near or through the northeast corner of our county does not do that.”

Members of the general public have submitted their objections, too. Many are calling for an environmental impact study that researches the proposed pipeline’s possible impacts to Iowa’s environment.

"The thought of this even being considered is ludicrous, and my neighbors are of the same opinion,” wrote Patricia Booth of Cedar Rapids in a letter submitted to the Board on Thursday. “Stop this nonsense and protect the land, people and animals from this hazardous pipeline."

Booth also requested that the meeting time be moved to a “time more conducive to the majority.”

In its order granting the informational meetings, the Iowa Utilities Board said that Wolf must provide parcel-specific maps at the meetings to each landowner, person residing on, or person in possession of land parcels where the pipeline would pass through. Only after each public meeting has concluded can Wolf reach out to the affected landowners in that county for surveying purposes, the Board said.

The Board also said that Wolf is required to file a mailing list for each county in the proposed pipeline’s path and give notice about the meetings to the residents in the land corridors in question.

Brittney J. Miller is an environmental reporter for The Gazette and a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues.

Comments: (319) 398-8370; brittney.miller@thegazette.com