Navigator CO2 pipeline informational meeting rescheduled for Jan. 24 in Floyd County

Editor’s note: A previously published story contained incorrect dates for some of these meetings. This updated story includes the correct dates.

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

A public informational meeting by a company proposing to build a carbon dioxide pipeline into Floyd County has been rescheduled for Monday, Jan. 24.

The meeting, by Navigator CO2 Ventures, had been scheduled for Dec. 17 but was canceled because of severe weather earlier that week, including the tornado that struck Rudd.

The rescheduled Floyd County meeting will begin at noon on Jan. 24, at the Youth Enrichment Center at the Floyd County Fairgrounds.

Two other meetings that had been scheduled for that week, in Franklin County and Butler County, were also rescheduled. The Franklin County meeting will be noon Friday, Jan. 21, at the Franklin County Convention Center in Hampton, and the Butler County meeting will be 6 p.m. Monday, Jan. 24, at the Greene Community Center in Greene.

Under Iowa Code, informational meetings are required to be held in each county in which real property or property rights would be affected by the proposed pipeline. All meetings must be concluded at least 30 days before the company can file a petition for a new pipeline permit.

Information about the Navigator project and a schedule of all the informational meetings can be found on the homepage of the Iowa Utilities Board home website, iub.iowa.gov.

Navigator CO2 Ventures announced in October that it was ready to begin the process of seeking pipeline approval from the Iowa Utilities Board, which includes holding a public meeting in each of the 36 counties in which the company proposes to bury its underground pipeline network.

The company hopes to receive approval from the five states included in the project — Minnesota, South Dakota, Nebraska and Illinois, in addition to Iowa — in time to construct the 1,300-mile pipeline and begin operations in early 2025.

It would capture carbon dioxide from ethanol plants including eight Valero plants, plus another dozen or so other ethanol and fertilizer plants, condense that CO2 to its liquid state and then transport it in underground pipelines to geological formations in central Illinois where it would be permanently stored a mile or more underground.

Navigator, a part of Navigator Energy Services of Dallas, Texas, is the second company to propose a carbon capture and storage (CCS) system that will include Iowa and its many ethanol and other carbon-producing facilities.

Summit Carbon Solutions held a public meeting in Floyd on Sept. 20 for a project that would involve Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska. That project would store the carbon dioxide underground in North Dakota.

The Summit Carbon project, proposed by Summit Ag Investors of Ames, would cut across Floyd County from east to west, including going through Charles City.

The Navigator project would come into Floyd County from the south, through Butler County, end would end a few miles south of Floyd at the Valero Renewables ethanol plant.