New Oklahoma laws on eminent domain and power generation

I tend to keep browser tabs around for a long time. I find an interesting story that I want to write about, but never get around to it. I'm going to try to get through a few in this entry, but will not let myself spend more than an hour. Here are a few recent stories on new laws passed this year by the Oklahoma legislature.

OK property owners can repurchase seized land after Nov. 1: This Fox23 story from October 28, 2025, reported on State Rep. Tom Gann's (R-Inola) bill to force the Oklahoma Transportation Commission (aka ODOT) to give the previous owners an opportunity to buy their land back if it is surplus to requirements. This was already being done if the previous owners still had a remnant of the land adjacent to the land that was taken; this bill requires that opportunity for a total taking as well. HB1103 was authored by Gann and sponsored by Sen. Ally Seifried in the Senate, and it passed by wide margins in both houses. (12:40)

Oklahoma leaders say behind-the-meter law protects ratepayers from data center costs: This is a News on 6 story from December 14, 2025, about an interview with State Rep. Paul Rosino and former State Rep. Jason Dunnington on an unidentified bill the story says passed in 2024:

"BTM basically says companies, data centers, if you want to come to Oklahoma and set up shop, then you pay for your own power," Dunnington said. "You build it yourself, you use your own power. That alone, the legislature looking out for the utility rate payers by passing that was massive, and it needs to get talked about more."

SB 480 actually is from the 2025 session, and it passed without opposition in both houses, with dozens of legislators signing on as co-sponsors. The new language doesn't appear to require large data centers from buying electricity from the existing public utilities, but it allows them to generate electricity on site, if they at least partially using natural gas. It exempts these private power-generating companies from being regulated by the Corporation Commission as public utilities. Here's a news story on a new Chickasha industrial park being developed under the new law. Previewing the bill before the session, the Oklahoma Electric Cooperative described SB 480 as "raising new challenges for [rural electric] cooperatives around infrastructure planning and peak demand."

There's some weird, interesting language that was deleted -- a special carveout for some company in Washington County and for generation of "green hydrogen." The Washington County language appears to date from 1971. ("Amended by Laws 1971, HB 1080, c. 26, § 1, emerg. eff. March 22, 1971; Amended by Laws 1971, HB 1257, c. 322, § 1, emerg. eff. June 24, 1971") The "green hydrogen" language was added by HB 4065 in 2024.

The same Oklahoma Electric Cooperative bulletin mentions HB 2752, which was to ban the use of eminent domain by private companies for renewable energy facilities (e.g. wind and solar farms) and to require a Certificate of Authority from the Corporation Commission before using eminent domain to extend high-voltage lines, using a process defined in HB 2756. Both bills passed overwhelmingly, but HB 2756 became law without the governor's signature.

(That's 58 minutes work, mainly spent looking up the actual bills -- easier if the news report mentions the bill number -- reading through them, and finding related stories.)