Houston pipeline operator Enterprise Products Partners will have to renegotiate with a Brazoria County landowner who sought $3.4 million for a pipeline easement across his property, the Texas 1st Court of Appeals ruled Thursday.
The decision overturns a November 2018 Brazoria County Court decision allowing the company to use eminent domain to acquire a 30-foot-wide swath of land from Terry Hlavinka for about $132,000 to route the Oyster Creek Lateral Project. The 49-mile pipeline moves propylene from Texas City to a petrochemical plant in Freeport.
The appeals court ruled that the pipeline was not a common carrier and therefore didn’t qualify for the type of eminent domain Enterprise sought to use.
Houston partners Clay Steely and Lauren Harris of Porter Hedges represent Hlavinka.
Read the Houston Chronicle’s full report here.