How would you like it if someone came on to your land to build a pipeline?

This is one of the questions you’ve no doubt heard in the media lately. A common question from protestors and their supporters. It’s been posed to media reporters asking protestors why they’re trying to shut down Canada. It’s been used as a headline for editorials in big newspapers. If you live in a city or even a small community you’ve never had to deal with a company that wants to build a pipeline on your property. That seems to make this question a good one.

However I come from a farming community and it occurred to me that I might just know some people who’ve had experience with pipeline companies. So I decided to message a friend of mine. He used to be a pretty good hockey player when we were growing up. He played with a temper. Years may have passed but I know he’s definitely no push over. Devon is not the kind of guy who’d let anyone walk all over him. Even a big pipeline company.

Turns out Devon actually has lots of experience with pipelines. When he moved onto his acreage 20 years ago there were already 5 lines running under it. 2 more lines have been buried since. The last one came through just last year. If you look at the first map you can see a place called Herschel. Herschel is Devon’s territory. The map shows where Enbridge Line 3 Replacement cut through his property just last year. The second map shows just how many lines are following that same route.

When I discovered a new line had been put down in the last year I thought he’d have some fresh memories of how that affected his life. It was my chance to ask someone who actually knows “How would you like it if someone came on your land to build a pipeline?”

Me: “What happens during construction?”

Devon: “The only inconvenience during pipeline construction for us has been delays on the roads. They haven’t affected our home lives at all.”

Me: “What about animals? How long before things get back to normal in their world?”

Devon: “Wildlife doesn’t seem bothered at all.” Then he asked me “What’s normal?” – and he sent me a video taken right in his yard last summer.

Me: “OK. The animals appear not to mind. Does it affect the quality of your land?”

Devon: “We don’t farm the affected land, but Enbridge recovers the top soil and replants whatever vegetation you want. In our case, grass.”

Me: “What would happen to you if there was a spill on your property?”

Devon: “We have never had a spill, or know of anyone that has. They have given us contact information, and instruction if we ever encounter what we feel may be a spill. Several times a week they fly (over) the pipeline inspecting it.

Me: “Are you fairly compensated?”

Devon: “We have been treated very fairly by Enbridge.”

I have to admit I was hoping for even a tiny bit of drama in this back and forth conversation. Just like you would with any conversation. So I put my reporter skills to work and decided to finish by asking an “emotional” question. Certainly there has to be even a little bit of anxiety over having a pipeline carrying flammable material close to your home… right under your own property. Everyone knows there have been accidents. So the natural question is..

Me: “Wouldn’t you rather there were no pipelines under your land and close to your home?

Devon: “I was actually disappointed when they told us the line 6 replacement was being routed around our acreage because they felt it would be too close to the house. I actually have never thought about whether I would rather live where there’s no pipelines. They’ve never been an issue.”

If I had to conclude this and I do, I would say that it would seem my friend Devon is one of the vast majority of people who pay some type of price for the conveniences of modern society. In his case it’s doesn’t seem the price is very high. Maybe he thinks the compensation is actually worth it. No. He’s never experienced an accident. He doesn’t know of anyone who even knows anyone who has. Like the rest of us, he only knows they’ve happened because he pays attention to the news. The only real difference is Devon actually has a half dozen pipelines running across his property. As you can see from the second map above, the energy running through them keeps people in the Eastern United States and Eastern Canada, warm in their homes and mobile in their vehicles.

Here’s what pipelines look like for the vast majority of those who have to live with them. In Devon’s case, 20 years of living with pipelines and zero problems. He’s not going to claim nothing could ever happen. All he can say is that nothing has ever happened.

If it weren’t for the sign, you wouldn’t know it’s there.

tvrd-pipelines-1-looking-west-through-northeast-corner-of-yard-image

Looking east at Devon’s yard (with a beautiful sunrise)

The pipelines are about 75 meters from Devon’s doorstep (this is the view from there)

Looking at Devon’s yard from pipeline.

Duane Rolheiser

After 15 years as a TV reporter with Global and CBC and as news director of RDTV in Red Deer, Duane set out on his own 2008 as a visual storyteller. During this period, he became fascinated with a burgeoning online world and how it could better serve local communities. This fascination led to Todayville, launched in 2016.

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Agriculture

In the USA, Food Trumps Green Energy, Wind And Solar

Published on September 8, 2025

Todayville

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Bonner Cohen

“We will not approve wind or farmer destroying Solar,” said President Trump in an Aug. 20 post on Truth Social. “The days of stupidity are over in the USA!!!”

Trump’s remarks came six weeks after enactment of his One Big Beautiful Bill terminated tax credits for wind and solar projects by the end of 2027.

The Trump administration has also issued a stop-work order for the Revolution Wind project, an industrial-scale offshore wind project 12 miles off the Rhode Island coast that was 80 percent completed. This was followed by an Aug. 29 announcement by the Department of Transportation that it was cutting around $679 million in federal funding for 12 offshore wind farms in 11 states, calling the projects “wasteful.”

Sending an unmistakable message to investors to avoid risking their capital on no-longer-fashionable green energy, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) is pulling the plug on a slew of funding programs for wind and solar power.

“Our prime farmland should not be wasted and replaced with green new deal subsidized solar panels,” said Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on a visit to Tennessee in late August. “We are no longer allowing businesses to use your taxpayer dollars to fund solar projects on prime American farmland, and we will no longer allow solar panels manufactured by foreign adversaries to be used in our USDA-funded projects.”

The White House is putting the squeeze on an industry that can ill-afford to lose the privileges it has enjoyed for so many years. Acknowledging the hesitancy of investors to fund green-energy projects with the looming phaseout of federal subsidies, James Holmes, CEO of Solx, a solar module manufacturer, told The Washington Post, “We’re seeing some paralysis in decision-making in the developer world right now.” He added, “There’s been a pretty significant hit to our industry, but we’ll get through it.”

That may not be easy. According to SolarInsure, a firm that tracks the commercial performance of the domestic solar industry, over 100 solar companies declared bankruptcy or shut down in 2024—a year before the second Trump administration started turning the screws on the industry.

As wind and solar companies confront an increasingly unfavorable commercial and political climate, green energy is also taking a hit from its global financial support network.

The United Nations-backed Net Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA) “has suspended activities, following the departure of numerous financial institutions from its ranks amid political pressure from the Trump administration,” The Wall Street Journal reported. Established in 2021, the NZBA’s 120 banks in 40 countries were a formidable element in global decarbonization schemes, which included support for wind and solar power. Among the U.S. banks that headed for the exits in the aftermath of Trump’s election were JP Morgan, Citi, and Morgan Stanley. They have been joined more recently by European heavyweights HSBC, Barclays, and UBS.

Wind and solar power require a lot of upfront capital, and investors may be having second thoughts about placing their bets on what looks like a losing horse.

“Wind and solar energy are dilute, intermittent, fragile, surface-intensive, transmission-extensive, and government-dependent,” notes Robert Bradley, founder and CEO of the Institute for Energy Research.

Given these inherent disadvantages of wind and solar power, it’s no surprise that the Department of Agriculture is throttling the flow of taxpayer money to solar projects. The USDA’s mission is to “provide leadership on food, agriculture, food, natural resources, rural development, nutrition, and related issues….” It is not to help prop up an industry whose best days are behind it.

Effective immediately, wind and solar projects will no longer be eligible for USDA Rural Development Business and Industry (B&I) Guaranteed Loan Program. A second USDA energy-related guaranteed loan program, known by the acronym REAP, will henceforth require that wind and solar installations on farms and ranches be “right-sized for their facilities.”

If project applications include ground-mounted solar photovoltaic systems larger than 50 kilowatts or such systems that “cannot document historical energy usage,” they will not be eligible for REAP.

Ending Misallocation Of Resources

“For too long, Washington bureaucrats and foreign adversaries have tried to dictate how we use our land and our resources,” said Republican Rep. Harriot Hagermann of Wyoming. “Taxpayers should never be forced to bankroll green new deal scams that destroy our farmland and undermine our food security.”

Hagermann’s citing of “foreign adversaries” is a clear reference to China, which is by far the world’s leading manufacturer of solar panels, according to the International Energy Agency.

According to a USDA study from 2024, 424,000 acres of rural land were home to wind turbines and solar arrays in 2020. While this – outdated – figure represents less than 0.05 percent of the nearly 900 million acres of farmland in the U.S., the prospect of ever-increasing amounts of farmland being taken out of full-time food production to support part-time energy was enough to persuade USDA that a change of course was in order.

Bonner Russell Cohen, Ph. D., is a senior policy analyst with the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT).

Agriculture

USDA reverses course under Trump, scraps Biden-era “socially disadvantaged” farm rules

Published on August 28, 2025

Todayville

MxM News

Quick Hit:

The Trump administration’s USDA is pulling back from defending Biden-era farm aid programs that gave preferential treatment based on race and gender. The move aligns with President Trump’s directive to dismantle remaining diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives across federal agencies.

Key Details:

The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty (WILL) sued on behalf of dairy farmer Adam Faust, challenging USDA aid programs that favor minorities and women.
Programs under scrutiny include loan guarantees, dairy coverage, and conservation incentives, all of which disadvantaged white male farmers.
USDA issued a final rule eliminating “socially disadvantaged” designations, stating programs must uphold meritocracy, fairness, and equal opportunity.

Diving Deeper:

The U.S. Department of Agriculture under the Trump administration is abandoning its defense of farm aid programs created during the Biden years that granted benefits based on race and gender. In a recent court filing, the USDA declined to defend several programs that civil rights watchdogs argue discriminated against white male farmers.

The litigation was brought forward by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty (WILL) on behalf of Adam Faust, a Wisconsin dairy farmer. Faust contends that the Biden-era rules violated equal protection principles by privileging minorities and women over others in loan guarantees, dairy margin coverage, and conservation cost-share programs.

Under the loan guarantee program, minority and female farmers could secure up to 95% federal backing on loans, while white male farmers were limited to 90%. This disparity directly affected borrowing power and interest rates. Similarly, the Dairy Margin Coverage Program charged white male farmers a $100 annual fee, while exempting “socially disadvantaged” farmers. In conservation projects, minority and female participants received up to 90% reimbursement for costs, while others received only 75%.

On July 10, the USDA issued a final rule to strike the “socially disadvantaged” designation from its regulations, calling it inconsistent with constitutional principles and with President Trump’s policy objectives. “Moving forward,” the USDA rule stated, “USDA will no longer apply race- or sex-based criteria in its decision-making processes, ensuring that its programs are administered in a manner that upholds the principles of meritocracy, fairness, and equal opportunity for all participants.”

The department noted that while the loan guarantee program will be amended immediately, officials are still reviewing how to apply the new policy to the dairy and conservation programs. The USDA also signaled that its decision “could obviate the need for further litigation,” though WILL has indicated its legal fight will continue.

“This lawsuit served as a much-needed reminder to the USDA that President Trump has ordered the end to all federal DEI programs,” said Dan Lennington, deputy legal counsel at WILL. “There’s more work to be done, but today’s victory gives us a clear path to do even more in the name of equality.”