Alverson v. Brown County

The federal district court for the District of South Dakota found that the owner of a 2,200-acre farm that primarily produces corn and the developer of an interstate pipeline to transport carbon dioxide to sequestration sites had sufficiently established standing to challenge a county’s moratorium on permits for hazardous waste pipelines. The court therefore denied the county’s motion to dismiss. The court cited allegations that due to nations and states adopting low carbon or clean fuel standards to reduce carbon emissions, the “future of South Dakota’s ethanol industry depends at least in part on the industry implementing strategies to reduce carbon emissions” and that the proposed pipeline would transport carbon dioxide from several ethanol production facilities, including one in which the farm owner had an interest. The court found that the plaintiffs had alleged a concrete, particularized, and actual injury based on the moratorium’s alleged impact on construction of the pipeline, even if there were other hurdles to the pipeline’s construction. The court also found that the plaintiffs’ claims that the federal Pipeline Safety Act preempted the county moratorium appeared to be ripe.