More than 100 South Dakota landowners are faced with eminent domain lawsuits as a major carbon capture company constructs a more than 2,000-mile pipeline spanning the upper midwestern plains. The pipeline is a project by Summit Carbon Solutions, with the goal of extracting CO2 emissions from midwestern ethanol plants and injecting the liquified gasses deep underground in North Dakota. A process known as carbon sequestration, the pipeline is an effort from the ethanol industry to capitalize on tax incentives offered by reducing corporations’ carbon footprint. Litigation over the pipeline’s encroachment on private property is now underway across nine counties in the state as rural residents object to the project on their land. Surveyors with Summit Carbon Solutions, however, are reportedly showing up on property while lawsuits remain pending. And the state’s Republican governor, Kristi Noem, is nowhere to be found.
Eminent Domain Is Imminent
On Tuesday, Jared Bossly, a farmer in the state’s northeastern Brown County who is opposed to the project crossing his property, reportedly found surveyors from the firm drilling a rig deep underground in the middle of his crop field. Bossly explained to Substack reporter Greg Price how the construction of the pipeline threatens the productivity of his 2,000-acre farm. “The route would force them to bulldoze many of the trees he has planted, jeopardizing the safety of his cows by removing the windbreaks used to protect them,” Price wrote. “He also said that the topsoil is only about a foot deep, which means moving it around will likely prevent crops from growing there again.”