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Power lines planned across Texas face an uncertain future after Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called on the Public Utilities Commission of Texas to deny pending applications for high-voltage transmission lines. The power lines have pitted the interests of the energy industry against ranchers and other private landowners.
The “transmission plan should not come at the expense of private property rights,” Patrick wrote in a social media post on Friday. “The current process being utilized by the PUC for proposing and approving transmission lines is broken and must be reformed.”
Patrick’s comments came after a 15-hour hearing of the Texas Senate Business and Commerce Committee, which included testimony from people who own property along the path of planned transmission lines.
The committee’s chairman, Sen. Charles Schwertner, called for a “complete overhaul” of the transmission line approval process. In a statement, Schwertner said testimony from last Wednesday’s hearing raised concerns, specifically about “the lack of proper notice from utilities, shortened timelines for Public Utility Commission proceedings, and due process at the State Office of Administrative Hearings.”
Schwertner also called for the PUC to deny the applications. He and Patrick said the Texas Legislature should revamp the permitting process when it meets in 2027.
Why are new transmission lines coming to Texas?
West Texas is home to America’s most productive oil and gas field, the Permian Basin, which stretches into New Mexico. Oil and gas interests in the region want more access to electricity to connect fuel production operations to the power grid, rather than relying on mobile diesel generators.
From the perspective of Texas Oil and Gas Association President Todd Staples, the approval process has taken long enough.
“This has not been moving fast, and if you talk to folks that have been waiting since 2013 to get what they need, they would tell you it’s not fast at all,” Staples said during the Wednesday hearing.
A push to electrify oil and gas production culminated in 2023 with a state law calling for three new east-to-west power lines that would improve connections between West Texas and the rest of the state.
READ MORE: These ranchers heal the land. The power company drew a line through it
In 2025, regulators at the PUC finalized a framework for building 765-kilovolt lines — the most efficient option that will carry more power than any other lines that currently exist in the state. Earlier this year, power companies including American Electric Power’s Texas division, Oncor, the city of San Antonio’s electric utility and the state-run Lower Colorado River Authority submitted applications to the PUC.
Since lawmakers voted to build new transmission lines in 2023, Texas has seen a boom in data center proposals. In a statement to Straight Arrow earlier this year, Staples said that in addition to benefits to the oil and gas industry, new transmission lines are “essential to support demand from growing sectors like AI.”
Why are landowners opposed to the transmission lines?
In June, Straight Arrow wrote about ranchers’ efforts to fight transmission lines and how landowners have the most to lose.
Texans who own property along planned transmission line routes have said the process is difficult to understand and goes too fast. If the permit — known as a Certificate of Convenience and Necessity or CCN — is approved, power companies may purchase private land using eminent domain.
“We can do better,” said J. Luther King, founder of a capital management firm who owns a ranch along one of the routes. King’s sharpest criticism went to the route options which he described as if someone had taken a “road map and a Crayola and just drew some lines.”
Another impacted property owner, Dave Clark, has been working with the nonprofit Friends of the San Saba River to help his neighbors understand their rights. When he saw Patrick and Schwertner’s statements Friday, Clark told Straight Arrow, he “was grateful that they reacted as quickly as they did.”
But the PUC process is already underway, and the agency does not answer to the lawmakers directly. Clark hopes the officials’ statements can sway the PUC commissioners’ decision and that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott will join in calling for the applications to be denied.
“There needs to be an evaluation before we go forward with these lines,” Clark said.
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