By Paul Hammel
LINCOLN - A Kansas pipeline company is about to activate its $1.5 billion pipeline to transport carbon dioxide from ethanol plants in Nebraska and Iowa to a sequestration site in Wyoming and, along with it, launch a first-of-its-kind program to share some proceeds with rural communities along the pipeline route.
On Tuesday, officials with Tallgrass Energy said they would soon be shipping CO2 from the first of 11 ethanol plants connected to its pipeline - a converted, former natural gas pipeline - for a 392-mile trip across Nebraska, Colorado, Iowa, and Wyoming.
In conjunction with the launch, Tallgrass announced it is making an initial donation of $500,000 to a fund managed by the Nebraska Community Foundation that could financially help more than 230 communities and community organizations on the route.
The company projects that more than $7 million will be distributed over 10 years through the "Trailblazer Community Investment Fund," with the money targeted for local early childhood centers, elder care facilities and food pantries. That is on top of lease payments to landowners and spending more than $450,000 on disaster response training sessions and equipment purchases for the mostly rural, volunteer fire and rescue departments along the pipeline route.
The investment fund was negotiated with the environmental group, Bold Nebraska, which was a leading opponent of construction of the Keystone XL crude oil pipeline across the state. The agreement has been hailed as a new blueprint for acceptance of large infrastructure projects that impact rural areas.
"It's important to us to strategically invest back into the communities who have supported the project's development," said Kyle Quackenbush, segment president at Tallgrass.
"We hope that these investments serve to provide a safety net to our neighbors throughout their lifetimes - from early childhood to eldercare - so that these communities can continue to grow and thrive," he said.
