They Can't Just Walk All Over Us: Farmers Resist a Pipeline.

• Author: Lydersen, Kari
• Position: Essay

Carlisle Kelly saved money from his Amtrak job for years to buy one of the last remaining wooded pieces of land in the expansive farm country of central Illinois. Because, as he tells it, "I'm crazy about the animals." An avid hunter and outdoorsman, he wanted to preserve the ancient oaks on a rare hilly, never-farmed area near LeRoy, Illinois, and restore farmland back into native foliage for wild turkeys and deer.

So Kelly, fifty-four, was furious last winter when representatives of Enbridge Inc., one of Canada's largest oil transport companies, told him they needed to survey his land to build a pipeline through it.

"To me, tearing those trees out to build a pipeline is like tearing my arms and fingers off," he says. "It's a miracle those trees are even there. I made a promise to protect them."

Enbridge wants to build a 175-mile, $350 million pipeline through Illinois to connect its northern and southern networks so that thick, gooey Albertan tar sand oil can be transported swiftly to Texas Gulf Coast refineries.

The proposed pipeline route runs through about 500 private parcels of land, largely farms. Enbridge is seeking a 120-foot-wide easement through this land to construct and maintain the pipeline, paying farmers market value for the land, fees for crops lost during construction, and compensation for land damage. The farmers would still own the land, and could resume farming over the pipeline once it is complete. A number of farmers have already signed contracts with Enbridge, but many others refuse.

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"I won't let them on my land for anything," says Bob Kelly (no relation to Carlisle). This eighty-one-year-old farmer says the land has been in his family for 125 years.

So Enbridge is seeking the power of eminent domain from the Illinois Commerce Commission, arguing that the energy its project would provide is in the American public good. The U.S. Department of Energy agrees, having filed a letter of support for the petition. But many residents aren't buying it.

"They can say all they want that this is for the good of America, but it's really just a big-money foreign oil company trying to make money," says Carlisle Kelly.

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