(This article written by the Iowa Capital Dispatch. Read the entire version HERE) – Attorneys for Summit Carbon Solutions argued Friday in Polk County District Court that the company’s proposed amendment to its permit for a carbon sequestration pipeline through Iowa should be decided on before a legal case against the permit can move forward. The Iowa Utilities Commission approved a permit in June 2024 for Summit Carbon Solutions to build more than 600 miles of a carbon sequestration pipeline in Iowa, with the condition that the company gain permits in the Dakotas before beginning construction.

The Sierra Club Iowa Chapter, along with several counties and individual landowners, then filed a lawsuit in fall 2024, seeking to overturn the IUC’s permit approval. The lawsuit alleged the proceedings were unfair and that Summit did not meet the definition of a common carrier. Summit filed a petition with the IUC on Sept. 15 to amend its approved permit. The amendment would remove the condition that required approval in the Dakotas and add several route and pipe-size modifications to the permit. This action followed Summit’s second permit denial in South Dakota and the enactment of a law barring the use of eminent domain for carbon pipelines in the state.

Summit also requested the court remand the Sierra Club and landowners’ case to the IUC and stay any future actions on the case until the IUC decided on the filed amendment petition. This was the issue before Polk County District Court Judge Scott Beattie Friday morning. Summit’s attorney, Bret Dublinske of Fredrickson & Byron in Des Moines, argued the IUC needed to rule on the amendment petition before the case against the permit could proceed. He argued the facts in the case would be outdated once the IUC ruled on the amendment and the courts would be presented with either duplicative litigation or a scenario in which the ruling did not match the most recent version of the permit.

Wally Taylor, on behalf of the Sierra Club Iowa Chapter, argued Summit did not supply sufficient information as to how the amendment would change the nature of the lawsuit against the IUC’s decision. Taylor asked the court to deny the motion to remand the case to the IUC.  Michelle Rabe, on behalf of the Iowa Utilities Commission, said while the IUC believes Summit’s request for remand is, “slightly outside” of how a remand is typically used, she believes there are three options forward, “none of which are ideal.”

Rabe said Beattie could deny the remand and allow the case to continue, in which case it would advance through the courts until eventually the Supreme Court issues what she said could be a “moot order” at that point because the permit might have changed via the IUC proceedings. The second option she presented was for the court to grant the remand and allow the IUC to rule on the amendment, in which case she predicted the parties would appeal the IUC’s decision and then the courts would be presented with potentially “parallel” cases.  The third option, she said, would be for the court to stay the decision and allow the IUC proceedings to play out, so that when that decision is appealed, the two cases can be consolidated.

Summit’s amendment petition with the IUC, per Dublinske and the filing, does not seek to do away with the IUC’s protections against a “pipeline to nowhere.” Instead of listing North Dakota as the ending point, Summit asks the permit be changed to instead condition pipeline construction to the company’s securement of “access to one or more sequestration sites and permits or agreements to allow it to reach such storage.”

Opponents suggested the amendment means that Summit plans to change its original route, which would have ended in North Dakota where the CO2 could be pumped into an underground rock formation.  A spokesperson for Summit said Friday the amendment “keeps open the option to transport CO2 west through Nebraska or north through South Dakota.”

Judge Beattie said he will work to issue an order as soon as possible, though he suspected it would be a “couple of weeks” before he able to issue a written order.