BATON ROUGE, LA – State officials moved quickly to reassure residents this week after killing House Bill 7, emphasizing that any future land seizures tied to carbon capture pipelines would be conducted strictly in areas where land currently exists.
“This should ease a lot of concerns,” one lawmaker said. “We’re not out here taking things that aren’t there. We’re focused entirely on land that is already owned by someone.”
HB7 sought to prohibit the use of eminent domain for carbon capture projects, a move supporters said would protect rural property owners from being forced into pipeline agreements. The bill’s failure, however, preserves the state’s ability to move forward with large-scale infrastructure projects requiring private land access.
Officials stressed that landowners will remain part of the process, primarily through formal notifications and occasional public meetings.
“We want transparency,” another official explained. “People deserve to know exactly when their land is about to become part of a much bigger plan one that will be responsible for storing millions of tons of harmful carbon beneath their waterways and gardens.”
“We’re confident this approach works,” one legislator said, “because historically, it always has for the people doing the taking.”
