Farm Bureau is urging Iowa’s utility regulators to strike a balance between the importance of energy supplies and infrastructure with the need to mitigate unavoidable negative impacts on agricultural land as they determine the fate of a proposed crude oil pipeline across the state, Don Petersen, director of government relations for the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation (IFBF) wrote in testimony to the regulators.

"The Iowa Farm Bureau be­­lieves that all sources of energy should be developed to keep future costs reasonable," Petersen wrote in testimony to the Iowa Utilities Board (IUB). "We also support the maintenance and improvement of our transportation infrastructure, including pipelines, to ensure that gas and oil supplies can meet demand and keep costs reasonable."

Protecting productivity

However, Petersen added, IFBF...