Pipelines and Farmland

[biglentil]

Its too risky to pull the abandoned pipelines next to working lines so the right away grows and grows. They are pretty good at putting top soil back these days but there is always loss.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Big Trans Canada pipelines accross some low pasture. Best producing pasture on the entire quarter. Warmer, deep compaction removed. I have one well site that won't grow anything, sidehill , water just pools. Another that produces better than the surroundings.

[ColevilleH2S]

Most of the survey maps of the quarters I farm look like Manhattan street maps there are so many oil, gas and electrical lines buried under them. Cave-ins and slumping are my biggest beef, since I no-till these small hollows never get filled in by regular cultivation anymore so it is a perennial battle to get someone out preseed or post harvest to deal with them. Off the top of my head I can think of dozens of spots that need work, but try to motivate the local operators to get a crew out to deal with them, good luck.

Last fall I gave a list of 5 locations to one company, only one was levelled and it was done right after a rain with probably the heaviest road grader they could find. the soil was so packed it could have supported primary weight traffic. The other 4 locations were never touched, in retrospect I wonder if that was a good thing.

Bouncing through all the slumps and lease roads while preforming field operations has taught me to do one thing. Remove that damn button on the top of every ball cap I own because eventually it will get driven into the top of my head as it meets the cab roof, a the result of driving through some slumped in crater.

[farming101]

Exactly Coleville, your adequately compensated until you're not. The headaches just keep coming, including the one where you drive the cap button into your head.

[stonepicker]

Why don't you run a disc lengthwise along your pipeline problem?

[foragefarmer]

Do not have any pipelines running through my farm, so I have never dealt with the problems associated with them. Just wondering do these oil companies not compensate you fairly financially? Many Agriville's have come on here claiming oil is the backbone of the economy for AB and SK, and production is all that matters. From what I'm reading on this thread some posters crop production is suffering from oil companies neglect, should this be part of the trade off?

[farmaholic]

Neglect would differ from the conditions that exist from the pipeline being there. Even when everything is put back to it's original state, the large diameter pipes create their own conditions that are different from the land adjacent to the corridor. Rocks can be removed, land re-levelled, this next one coming through even paid for a fertilizer application to remedy the potential for burying nutrients too deep for the crop to easily access. It's the hard, drier conditions produced from the warmth generated by the pipeline that can't be countered.

Once again....do you want the equiivelant to a yearly lease payment versus a lump sum payment...or a combination of both?

[farmaholic]

The next one coming through paid about $93K for running across a whole quarter on an angle. They kinda pay the the meter, and acre and crop loss for several years and other odds and ends. The pipeline that came through before this next one paid about the same price as what the land cost me.

I heard oil field collector lines(terminology?) aren't anywhere near as lucrative.

Remember Enbridge is not an oil company....it is in the business of transporting oil. And I still say better under the ground in a pipe than on top on the rail. Even if I never had the pipe across my land, I'd think the same way.

Is it an inconvenience? Can you live with the limitations placed upon the land (future development)? I think I would rather have a pipe than a major hydro-electric line running across my land. I've seen land close to major centers that are an obstacle course of hydro poles(singles, doubles and the major steel ones).

[foragefarmer]

The next one coming through paid about $93K for running across a whole quarter on an angle. How many acres does this represent?

[farmaholic]

The next one coming through paid about $93K for running across a whole quarter on an angle. How many acres does this represent?

2.59 acres of purchased RIGHT OF WAY
7.17 acres of work space

Forage... the payment consists of many things, the actual easement/ROW purchase is better than what land is actually selling for but there are alot of other things that make up the bulk of the payment. I'm not going to itemize them...