Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds vetoed the bill that would have protected private landowners from carbon pipelines that want to use eminent domain to obtain easements.
The House approved SF 639 after 13 republicans and all 15 of the democrats joined together to support it, refusing to vote on the budget bill until SF 639 was brought up for debate.
Doyle Turner, an Iowa landowner who is active in the Free Soil Coalition said the House has the 2/3 majority needed to override the veto, but the Senate doesn’t appear to.
“We have a supermajority of republicans in both chambers, so this highlights the fact that we have a serious split within the Republican party,” he said.
“…HF 639 isn’t just about eminent domain. It goes much further – and indoing so, sets a troubling precedent that threatens Iowa’s energy reliability, economy and reputation as a place where businesses can invest with confidence,” said Governor Reynolds in an official letter to the Secretary of State.
“For example, the bill would block a major pipeline project that uses only voluntary easements. Southwest Iowa Renewable Energy is in the final stages of connecting to a CO2 pipeline with not a single acre condemned. Yet new insurance mandates and an arbitrary 25-year limit that HF 639 places on CO2 pipelines would effectively kill the project – despite the millions that have already been spent on its development. There is no clear or logical basis for that time limit – and it would make it difficult for companies like SIRE to justify the additional investment,” she said.
“I understand that was not the intent. Those who crafted the bill said they don’t want to stop CO2 pipelines that rely entirely on voluntary easements. But that is exactly what the bill does. For that reason alone, I cannot sign it,” said Governor Reynolds.
The bill was a “conglomeration” of several bills, said Turner. “It was kind of an omnibus bill (for carbon pipelines)” he said. “It required pipeline companies to carry insurance, it had definitions for a common carrier, it had definitions for a commodity. It had regulations for the Iowa Utilities Commission. There was a lot of house cleaning to make our IUC more responsive to the people,” he said. The bill also stated that hazardous liquid pipeline companies could not receive eminent domain powers unless they qualify as common carriers, meaning they can prove they will sell the commodity to an unaffiliated buyer.
Turner said Reynolds has indicated that she would back Summit Carbon Solutions, a carbon sequestration pipeline company trying to gain permits and easements to build across Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota, Minnesota and North Dakota.
“I’d like to say it (the veto) was a surprise, but it wasn’t. Everyone assumed that the governor has been on the side of Summit Carbon Solutions,” said Turner.
“The best thing about passing 639 is that now we know who is with us and who isn’t,” he said.
“It boils down to money. The Governor landed on the side of the money,” said Turner. “Our former governor Terry Branstad is heavily invested in Summit Carbon Solutions,” he said. “If they hired one former governor, why wouldn’t they hire two?”
“To be clear: the Iowa government has given this private company the right to take people’s land for one reason: corporate earnings,” said Senator Kevin Alons (R-Salix) said in a statement. “This has nothing to do with public use. It’s absolutely not necessary for the ethanol industry in our state … And it certainly is not what the founders had in mind.”