With the proposal of a second phase of an underground pipeline project that was submitted by Summit Carbon Solutions to the Iowa Utilities Commission, a public meeting in Jefferson has been organized by some of the parties who are against it.

Greene County resident Chris Henning is one of the landowners in the Cooper area that would be impacted by the proposed route and she spoke at the most recent Board of Supervisors meeting this past Monday. She said the route that Summit has proposed would go across the county to POET Biorefining in Guthrie County and capture liquid carbon dioxide from ethanol plants via an underground pipeline and stored in an underground facility in North Dakota and impact eight townships. 

Henning is with the Sierra Club and that organization has formally submitted its objections to both the first and second phases of the pipeline project. The IUC has approved Summit’s first permit for the pipeline, with certain requirements that need to be met before construction can begin. The permits in the four other states that are included in this project, Nebraska, North and South Dakota, and Minnesota have not yet granted any permits at this time. 

There is a public meeting scheduled for tomorrow from 7-8:30pm at the Jefferson City Hall Council Chambers for all impacted landowners about their property rights and other concerns with the project. A similar meeting was held Tuesday evening in Guthrie Center. Summit will also have a public informational meeting on August 28th at noon at Clover Hall on the Greene County Fairgrounds.