Texas Is Building $2B in Transmission for Oil Fields, Routing It Through Homes, and Skipping the Need Test

A grassroots coalition of Texas landowners and bipartisan legislators is pushing back against what may be one of the nation's largest transmission-permitting failures: a $2 billion buildout of 765-kilovolt lines across the state, routed deliberately through private property in the Permian Basin to serve oil and gas industry electrification, approved by the Public Utility Commission under a process created by statute in 2023 that experts say skips the grid-need analysis that federal regulators (and Texas itself) normally require.^[1]

The mechanism driving this is straightforward. In 2023, the Texas Legislature passed HB 5066, directing the PUC to implement a "Permian Basin Reliability Plan" (PBRP) to address what grid managers called load growth in West Texas oil fields.^[6] The statute bypassed the standard transmission-planning process, the economic and engineering review that would force utilities to prove the line is needed and compare it against non-wires solutions like dynamic line rating (measuring actual thermal headroom instead of seasonal static ratings), advanced reconductoring (new high-capacity wires on existing towers), or storage-as-transmission alternatives. Because the utilities building these lines earn a FERC-regulated return on capital, they have no incentive to choose the cheaper option. A state-directed carve-out that skips that scrutiny is exactly the mechanism that locks in the most expensive path forward. Texas created one.

The second mechanism is landowner harm without real remedy. Residents in Central Texas report that they were not properly notified of public meetings or route changes, despite their land being folded into the project footprint;^[8] several hundred property owners have petitioned the PUC to pause the case pending review of notice and broader questions about timing and necessity.^[8] Eminent domain for private profit, taking land not for public use but for utilities to rate-base and earn returns on, is a legitimate grievance, and one Texas law makes worse: the state has no requirement that utilities pay landowners annual easement fees (the market standard in many states); one-time acquisition payments are substantially lower and leave rural residents with no stake in project success. That structural imbalance, extractive terms, no community benefit agreement, no real choice about routing, is what turns "necessary infrastructure" into what landowners call "your home being invaded."^[7]

The third piece is the failure to demand proof of need. Sen. Charles Schwertner, chair of the Senate Committee on Business and Commerce, called for the PUC to reject the applications and said the Legislature would overhaul the process next session, writing that "these concerns demonstrate the need for a complete overhaul" before the applications advance.^[2] Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick stated publicly that while transmission lines may be necessary, they "should not come at the expense of private property rights."^[2] Those are not edge positions; they are the starting point for honest transmission planning. The question that should be on the record in every docket is: has the incumbent utility (in this case, Oncor and others) been required to document that the line is needed, that alternatives including GETs (grid-enhancing technologies) were evaluated by an independent party, and that the routing minimizes impact on private property? The bundle shows that answer is no. The PUC created a statutory carve-out and used it.

What a fair process would look like: competitive bidding for the transmission right (which FERC Order 1000 requires, but Texas supplemental-project statutes can avoid); mandatory independent evaluation of dynamic line rating, advanced reconductoring, and storage alternatives before any new towers are approved; a six-month public input period with real notification to every affected landowner; and if right-of-way is necessary, negotiated easement terms that include annual payments, genuine community benefit agreements, and a demonstrated public benefit, not just utility profit. The Legislature can write this into law when it returns in 2027. It should start by repealing the PBRP carve-out and routing all transmission planning through the competitive regional process, with GETs-first review and independent verification of need.