A recent article from Successful Farming shows that (as of late February) Summit Carbon Solutions—a company that, like Navigator CO2 Ventures, wants to build a carbon pipeline through Iowa—has gotten less than 2% of the voluntary easements that it needs to build its pipeline through Iowa. What this means is that neighbors are standing together with neighbors, protecting 98% of the land from Summit’s private industry project.
This is incredible evidence of the strength of rural Iowans. You see, this pipeline deeply offends us. This issue isn’t just about our land; it’s about the land—the land that feeds the world, the land that we all care for, the land we steward, the land, fertile and rich, that we want to pass to the next generation. The soil that we have here is irreplaceable—Mother Nature took a thousand years to make it, but a pipeline would undo all of that, in one year.
There is wealth in the land—everyone knows that.
But what do I mean by “wealth”? And what do I mean by “land”? Soil is a part of what “land” is about, no doubt. But that isn’t all that I mean when I say that there is wealth in the land. Land, for many of us, means something more than just a line on a balance sheet. Land isn’t just a possession—isn’t just dirt. It’s about our heritage, and it’s about our hope. “Land,” for us, is about the abundance of life that is rooted in the earth, and that, fundamentally, is not of our own making.
One of my neighbors said to me: “It’s not like the land is a part of me, but like I am a part of the land.” He said it well. That’s the gift bestowed on us by the land—it places us face-to-face with something greater, something true.
And so, the wealth of the land isn’t about what we own—it’s about to whom our lives are responsible: to corporate executives, to private investors, to influential politicians… or, to the gift of life that we are called to steward?
Private corporations want to take the part of the wealth that is seen on a property deed, but they disregard what the land really means—they disregard the part that is the true gift. It’s because of this that we are not signing voluntarily easements with these pipeline companies.
It takes strength to stand up to powerful corporate and political forces. But the strength doesn’t have to come from you or from me, alone. Please, consider all of the strength that Mother Nature has shown you—and what you might show for her, in return. Know that your neighbors are considering the same thing. Will you join us?