(Radio Iowa) – The Sierra Club’s Iowa Chapter has filed a lawsuit that seeks to overturn state approval of a permit for the Summit Carbon Solutions pipeline.

In late June the Iowa Utilities Commission issued a permit for construction of the initial route for the carbon pipeline, giving Summit eminent domain authority to seize property from landowners who have not voluntarily agreed to let the pipeline run through their property. The Sierra Club’s Jess Mazour said people who objected to the pipeline did not get a fair hearing before the Iowa Utilities Commission.

“Our evidence was not given the weight that it should have and there’s some serious due process violations,” Mazour said, “but we really have a strong case and we finally get to take our case to court and have an unbiased decision maker.” Wally Taylor, an attorney for the Sierra Club, said the commission incorrectly ruled Summit’s pipeline had a public benefit as a so-called common carrier that may be granted eminent domain authority.

“It’s like when Walmart has their own semis pick up products from various vendors, put in on the semi and take it to a Walmart store, once it gets in that Walmart truck, it’s Walmart’s property,” Taylor said. “That Walmart truck is not a common carrier.”

Jess Mazour has been the Sierra Club Iowa Chapter’s conservation program coordinator for the past four years.

Taylor said the lawsuit cites other “misstatements of fact and faulty legal conclusions.” Mazour said the commission’s decision was not unexpected after Governor Reynolds replaced the commission’s chairwoman and appointed another commission member in the spring of 2023. “From that minute on, the process was sped up,” Mazour said. “They moved deadlines sooner than what we had been told by the former board.”

The Sierra Club is arguing the Iowa Utilities Commission showed a pattern of favoritism to Summit and contempt for pipeline opponents during the public hearing about the project that stretched over 25 days last fall. “We were expected to go through security and we couldn’t bring in water to the hearing or food, but yet Summit could go in the back door and had their lunch catered in and had coffee,” Mazour said. “It’s just little things like that throughout the whole process that it’s very obvious this new board had their mind made up.”

Five Iowa counties, landowners who object to the pipeline and nearly 40 Republican legislators have filed separate appeals. Summit Carbon Solutions issued a statement earlier this week, saying the company is confident in the Iowa Utilities Commission’s thorough review process. Summit, ethanol producers and Iowa Corn Growers have argued the carbon pipeline will help grow markets for ethanol in the U.S. and abroad and benefit farmers.

After plans were pulled for a separate Navigator CO2 pipeline, Summit has begun the process of seeking another state permit to extend its pipeline to ethanol plants that initially signed on to join the proposed Navigator pipeline.