North Dakota Carbon-Capture Pipelines Offer Climate Aid; Activists Wary

by Stephen Groves (Associated Press) Two companies seeking to build thousands of miles of pipeline across the Midwest are promising the effort will aid rather than hinder the fight against climate change, though some environmental groups remain skeptical.

The pipelines would stretch from North Dakota to Illinois, potentially transforming the Corn Belt into one of the world’s largest corridors for a technology called carbon capture and storage.

Environmental activists and landowners have hindered other proposed pipelines in the region that pump oil, carrying carbon that was buried in the earth to engines or plants where it is burned and emitted. The new projects would essentially do the opposite by capturing carbon dioxide at ethanol refineries and transporting it to sites where it could be buried thousands of feet underground.

Both companies planning the pipelines appear eager to tout their environmental benefits. Their websites feature clear blue skies and images of green fields and describe how the projects could have the same climatic impact as removing millions of cars from the road every year.

However, some conservationists and landowners are already wary of the pipelines’ environmental benefits and safety, raising the chances of another pitched battle as the projects seek construction permits.

The pipelines could fall into a longstanding divide among environmentalists. President Joe Biden and many Republicans are pushing a strategy for tackling climate change that offers a financial boon to industries that use carbon capture and storage to reduce their emissions. But others, such as Greenpeace and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, argue the focus should be completely on developing renewable energy sources and that carbon capture just prolongs dependence on fossil fuels.

Navigator CO2 Ventures, which is planning a pipeline that will stretch over 1,200 miles (1,931 kilometers) through Iowa, South Dakota, Nebraska, Minnesota and Illinois, says it is offering “carbon capture solutions for a greener planet.” While Summit Carbon Solutions, whose pipeline will connect refineries in Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota to a sequestration site in North Dakota, says it plans to build the world’s largest carbon capture and storage project. Both hope to start some operations by 2024.

Crabtree (Brad Crabtree, who oversees carbon management policy at the Great Plains Institute), who also directs a group called Carbon Capture Coalition, sees it as a way to bridge partisan divides as the country addresses climate change. As evidence, he points to one high-profile Republican backer — North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum — who is pushing a plan to make the state carbon-neutral by 2030, “through innovation not regulation.”

Ethanol refineries could represent the low-hanging fruit that helps push the technology forward into widespread use. Plants such as corn are natural sponges of carbon dioxide, absorbing the gas and storing carbon as they grow through the spring and summer. When those crops ferment into ethanol, which is eventually mixed with gasoline, it produces a steady, easily-captured stream of carbon dioxide.

Despite concerns from Raffensperger and others about potential leaks from the pipelines or storage sites, the Environmental Protection Agency has concluded that storing carbon dioxide is safe as long as companies do it carefully. It is injected in a liquefied state into porous rock formations, where it eventually dissolves or hardens into minerals.

Crabtree said there has not been a single human fatality or serious injury in the United States from transporting or storing captured carbon dioxide. READ MORE

Excerpt from Politico's Morning Energy: THE PIPES ARE CALLING: Even as Democrats edge forward on the most aggressive climate legislation in U.S. history, they're getting some grief from advocates who are usually solidly in their corner: anti-pipeline advocates. At issue is $2 billion in the bipartisan infrastructure bill to help develop new pipeline networks to carry carbon dioxide from industrial emitters to underground storage sites.

A massive buildout of carbon capture, utilization and sequestration infrastructure is a priority for a wide array of interest groups, from the fossil fuel industry, who view it as an immediate way to mitigate their carbon footprint, to climate hawks in Congress and the administration who call for using every tool available to curb emissions.

Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party who spearheaded efforts against the now-canceled Keystone XL pipeline, said Nebraska farmers have received calls from pipeline companies interested in look at their land for siting of a proposed carbon dioxide pipeline system. “There is such little education on this out there, even among climate champions, that people feel like they’re getting sold, just like they got sold with fracking early on,” Kleeb said. “That money for pipelines shouldn't be in there, I’m sorry. If these measures are necessary, let oil companies handle them, not taxpayers.”

CCUS defenders, including pipeline company Navigator, say the idea isn't to prolong the use of fossil fuels, but to keep the gases driving climate change from reaching the atmosphere. “From an environmental perspective, if you want to decarbonize, what’s the quickest way to do so? This checks the box,” Elizabeth Burns-Thompson, Navigator’s vice president for government relations. Ben Lefebvre delivers the details here. READ MORE