Farmers pressed for answers re­­garding how a proposed oil pipeline crossing Iowa would affect farmland drainage and environmental safety last week during informational meetings about the project.
Dick Swanson, a Webster County landowner and former drainage tile contractor, said pipeline construction often creates wet areas in a field that didn’t exist before due to compaction or damage to drainage tile.
Adam Broad, senior project manager for Energy Transfer Partners, the company that wants to build the proposed 1,134-mile Dakota Access pipeline, pledged the company would restore farmland “to its original condition or better.” The company goes to great lengths to keep top soil and subsoil separated as it digs trenches and mitigates compaction as much as possible, he ...