CO2 sequestration will soon become a major problem for land owners in Nebraska. When the State Legislature passed LB 650 on Final Reading back in 2021, I was the only State Senator who voted against the bill. Those State Senators who voted for the bill will soon begin regretting their decision to have voted for the bill. So, today I would like to tell you about another reason why LB 650 was such a bad idea and why it will soon be haunting State Senators as well as land owners all across our state.

The companies who want to build CO2 sequestration pipelines in Nebraska, such as Tallgrass, Summit, and others, have little regard for the rights of landowners and will use the law to their advantage to build their CO2 pipelines against the wishes of land owners in Nebraska. In short, LB 650 allows CO2 sequestration companies to infringe on the rights of landowners. Let me explain.

Nebraska State Statute 76-725 specifically states that eminent domain can only be used by the State of Nebraska to acquire lands “necessary for any state use.” Our forefathers in Nebraska understood that private ownership of property was a basic and sacred right of the people, and that private lands should never be seized by corporations or private businesses for the purposes of creating wealth.

The lobbyists and lawyers who convinced former Nebraska State Senator, Mike Flood, to introduce LB 650 understood this full well. So, when LB 650 was written, it was written in such a way as to make CO2 sequestration a matter of the “public interest,” but we should ask: Is the underground storage of carbon dioxide really a matter of the public interest?

Language matters. LB 650 begins with these words, “The Legislature finds, recognizes, and declares, that it is in the public interest to promote the geologic storage of carbon dioxide. Doing so will benefit the state and the global environment by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and will help ensure the viability of the state’s energy and power industries, to the economic benefit of Nebraska and its citizens.” (There is no scientific proof that CO2 sequestration will do any of this!) This language is important, though, because it opens the door for the use of eminent domain by CO2 sequestration companies.

CO2 sequestration companies are for-profit businesses who plan to make billions of dollars through federal government subsidies and tax credits. While there is currently only about 5,000 miles of CO2 pipelines in the United States, CO2 companies are projected to build a total of 100,000 miles of CO2 pipelines across the United States, most of which will cut directly through agricultural lands. The Biden Administration’s Inflation Reduction Act is paying for it all and is set to fund the building of these pipelines with billions of dollars of taxpayer monies.

The building of CO2 pipelines would never succeed in a purely free-market economy. The entire industry is dependent upon these federally funded taxpayer dollars. Because the industry is entirely dependent upon these federal subsidies and tax credits, it raises the question of what would happen once the federal spigot gets turned off. There is good reason to believe that both Congress and the Trump Administration may act to put an end to the program. Once that happens, who will maintain the CO2 pipelines which have already been built?

62 accidents have already been reported with CO2 pipelines. When CO2 pipelines explode, they release powerful and toxic amounts of carbon dioxide, which have already been known to kill some Americans. Consequently, without some kind of private funding, the maintenance on these CO2 sequestration pipelines could potentially become an unfunded mandate imposed on the American people for decades.

Folks in Nebraska need to get involved with this issue now. Citizens need to familiarize themselves with the zoning laws of their county, attend county board meetings, and share their concerns about CO2 pipelines with their elected officials. Likewise, citizens need to be made aware of the effects that CO2 pipelines will have on their community and elected officials need to respect the concerns of the people who elected them into office.