Statewide Iowa (RI) — The top Republican in the Iowa Senate will be sponsoring a bill next year that would give developers like Summit Carbon Solutions more leeway in altering the route of pipelines. It would also apply to other utility infrastructure, like transmission lines.
Senate Majority Leader Mike Klimesh of Spillville says for the past three months he’s been talking with Senate Republicans about ideas to resolve the debate over the carbon pipeline soon after the 2026 legislature convenes in January.
Under his proposal, once a company submits a proposed route to Iowa utility regulators, developers could adjust that route within a 10-mile corridor to avoid property owned by people who don’t want the project running through their land.
Klimesh says last spring the legislature spent a lot of time navigating through a debate over a bill that was complex and he’s hoping a simpler solution prevails.
A dozen Republican Senators refused to vote on state budget plans last spring and joined Democrats in passing a wide-ranging pipeline bill that Governor Reynolds vetoed in June. In late September Klimesh said the pipeline issue wasn’t going away and he was searching for a solution that could unify Senate Republicans.
KIWA Staff Photo
