North Dakota
During Grand Forks visit, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg touts benefits of planned rail underpass
GRAND FORKS — U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg on Monday touted the benefits of a $30 million grant designed to improve safety and efficiency at one of the state’s most troublesome rail crossings.
Eric Hylden/Grand Forks Herald
The project will construct a vehicle underpass at the intersection of 42nd Street and DeMers Avenue in Grand Forks, allowing unimpeded north-south travel for vehicle traffic. The underpass also will include a 10-foot-wide path for pedestrians and cyclists.
The grant is one of 63 awarded nationwide, totaling more than $570 million within the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (USDOT) railroad crossing elimination program, which has worked to improve safety at more than 400 railway crossings. It is part of the $1 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, signed into law in November 2021 by the Biden administration.
Buttigieg made the announcement at a ceremony Monday in Grand Forks. During the event, he said he admires Grand Forks’ dedication to improving its future, and cited the project as evidence.
“I’m really happy to be here and have the chance to see this community, and the pride people take in it,” he said. “I’ll be honest: The first time I ever heard of Grand Forks was when you had those terrible floods in the 1990s. The whole nation paused to see how you would recover, lift each other up and build a better future. Now, you’re living in that future that you helped each other toward, and we’re trying to make that future even brighter.”
Mayor Brandon Bochenski thanked local, state and federal leaders for their work in securing the grant.
“I would like to thank our federal delegation for raising awareness of this project at a national level and for continuing to champion Grand Forks,” Bochenski said. “This is the largest federal grant for a road project in Grand Forks’ history. I would also like to thank our city engineering staff for their relentless work along with the North Dakota Department of Transportation and (rail company) BNSF to try to find a funding solution for this project.”
Gary Lorenz, fire chief of the Grand Forks Fire Department, said the underpass will “significantly improve public safety within the city.” He cited the elimination of potential vehicle-train collisions at the intersection, along with unimpeded travel for emergency responders to the northwest section of the city.
Eric Hylden/Grand Forks Herald
“Emergencies will and do occur at any time of the day or night,” Lorenz said. “If first responders must take alternative routes, or dispatch different units because trains are occupying this intersection, precious lifesaving minutes are lost.”
According to Buttigieg, the intersection has experienced 69 crashes causing 12 injuries over the past five years, including a vehicle-train collision, and has been “the railroad crossing with the most complaints in North Dakota.”
“The mayor let me know that the 42nd Street rail crossing is something the community here has been working on addressing since 1991,” Buttigieg said. “And with good reason. The university has made clear its concerns about the lack of safe crossing for students walking or biking around here. This crossing right here has received more complaints than any other in the state of North Dakota.”
Buttigieg also said the underpass will be a boon for commerce by reducing shipping delays.
“You don’t have to live anywhere near North Dakota to feel the impact any time things are not as fluid as they ought to be on the highways or rail lines that come through this state,” he said.
U.S. Sen. Kevin Cramer — a ranking member on the Senate Subcommittee on Transportation and Infrastructure — said he is impressed with the level of bipartisanship on the subject of infrastructure.
“Working on that bill was one of the joys of my career so far in Congress,” said Cramer, R-N.D. “We passed two bills in our committee unanimously. You know how hard it is to do things unanimously in Washington? Well, it’s not that hard when you do the right thing, and you’re talking about one thing everyone agrees on. And that’s that infrastructure is critical to our safety, security and the efficient movement of goods and services.”
Buttigieg also praised the spirit of bipartisanship that helped the grant’s funding source come to fruition.
“As Senator Cramer said, you usually find people having trouble believing that you can get anything done on a bipartisan basis in today’s Washington,” he said. “Here you have this bipartisan infrastructure law that has helped to make possible grants across the country and North Dakota. I think there’s something poetic about the fact that Republicans and Democrats crossed the aisle to work together so that pedestrians and vehicles will be able to cross this intersection safely.”
Banish covers news pertaining to K-12 and higher education, as well as county commission coverage.
North Dakota’s Industrial Commission on Thursday approved a plan to accept millions of tons of carbon dioxide to be permanently stored underground against the wishes of some landowners in the storage area.
Iowa-based Summit Carbon Solutions plans to build a network of pipelines that gathers carbon emissions from ethanol plants across five states. If built, the pipeline will end west of Bismarck, where three injection wells will pump the carbon deep beneath private property into pore space — gaps and voids between the rocks.
Summit compensates landowners for use of their pore space but an attorney for a group of landowners questions the accuracy of the model used by Summit to estimate where the gas will go when it is pumped underground.
The Industrial Commission is composed of outgoing Gov. Doug Burgum, Attorney General Drew Wrigley and Agriculture Commissioner Doug Goehring, who approved the permits unanimously.
Thursday’s action by the Industrial Commission uses a North Dakota rule governing pore space called amalgamation. If at least 60% of the landowners in the pore space area approve, the other 40% are forced to comply.
A lawsuit by the Northwest Landowners Association in North Dakota is already challenging the constitutionality of the amalgamation rule.
About 92% of landowners in the sequestration area for Summit are participating voluntarily. The region includes parts of Oliver, Mercer and Morton counties. Department of Mineral Resources staff said landowners objecting to the project accounted for less than 2% of the acres. Carbon will be injected into the Broom Creek Formation about 5,500 feet below ground level.
Summit estimates it will pump about 18 million tons of carbon dioxide into the storage area each year. The company will take advantage of federal tax credits — $85 per ton of carbon stored — as an incentive to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“These sequestration permits are the result of years of rigorous scientific study, engineering design, and input from regulators, landowners, and local leaders,” Wade Boeshans, executive vice president of Summit Carbon Solutions, said in a news release. “With these permits, we’re one step closer to providing vital infrastructure that benefits farmers, ethanol producers, and communities across the Midwest.”
The carbon will come from 57 ethanol plants in five states — Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota.
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Access to carbon capture and storage can significantly reduce an ethanol plant’s carbon score. Low-carbon ethanol may be able to fetch a premium price, which could also benefit corn growers. The carbon is captured during the fermentation process of turning corn into ethanol fuel.
Tharaldson Ethanol at Casselton is the only North Dakota ethanol plant in the Summit pipeline project.
Minnesota PUC grants long-awaited permit for carbon capture pipeline
Two other North Dakota ethanol plants are already capturing and sequestering carbon — Red Trail Energy at Richardton and Blue Flint Ethanol near Underwood. Those plants sit close to the areas with the suitable geology for carbon sequestration.
Summit Carbon Solutions has obtained pipeline permits in Iowa and North Dakota. Minnesota approved a short segment of the route Thursday.
Summit still still needs a permit in South Dakota. Nebraska has no state agency that permits carbon pipelines.
In most states, it is the Environmental Protection Agency that permits CO2 storage wells, but North Dakota was the first state to be granted primacy in Class VI injection well permitting.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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UND, RANKED 16, AND ST. CLOUD STATE, RANKED 9, CLASH AT THE RALPH THIS WEEKEND FOR AN NCHC BATTLE.
GRAND FORKS, N.D. (KVRR) –Fresh off a sweep over Miami of Ohio last weekend, North Dakota is looking to bring that momentum into the Ralph Friday against number-9 ranked St. Cloud State.
North Dakota trails the Huskies by just a single point in the NCHC standings coming in and a big emphasis this weekend is special teams. NoDak with a top-5 power play in the country, and St. Cloud State with a top-5 penalty kill. The team says their focus this weekend is on that and getting off to a fast start.
“Obviously our power play has really been clicking,” said recently named NCHC defenseman of the week Abram Wiebe. “It just starts with good puck movement, moving the puck fast and they got a good PK. It’s always, for us, outwork the PK and the PK is outwork the power play. So, it’s going to be a battle going into this weekend. Obviously, just use that last weekend as confidence and then try to win this first 10 minutes against St. Cloud and just kind of go from there.”
North Dakota is ranked number-16 in the most recent USCHO poll,their lowest ranking of the season thus far.
Part of their early season struggles can be attributed to their health. This past weekend, UND was without five players including its captain and two alternates due to injury. Head coach Brad Berry says he expects at least one player back in the lineup this weekend and credits his players for having the next man up mentality.
“Caleb McDonald will be in the lineup,” said Berry. “What I love about our group right now is there are some guys that aren’t wearing a letter, that are older players, that are in leadership roles right now. And I think that’s going to serve us well in the second half.”
This weekend’s series with the Huskies will be the final series of 20-24. North Dakota will next return to the ice January 4 for an exhibition with Manitoba before returning to conference play January 10 and 11 vs. the newest member of the NCHC: Arizona State
Puck drop Friday night with St. Cloud State is slated for 7:07 P.M.
Saturday night’s game two will be at 6:07 P.M.
North Dakota is 4-3-3 vs. the Huskies in their last 10 battles.
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