{"id":396320,"date":"2026-08-03T11:25:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T11:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/396320\/"},"modified":"2026-08-03T11:25:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T11:25:08","slug":"texas-regulators-urged-to-halt-33b-transmission-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/396320\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas regulators urged to halt $33B transmission plan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Powerful Texas Republicans are asking state regulators to pause a $33 billion transmission build-out \u2014 a move that could slow efforts to bring a slew of data centers online.<\/p>\n

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and state Sen. Charles Schwertner called Friday for the Public Utility Commission of Texas to reject pending applications to build extra-high voltage power lines across the state.<\/p>\n

Both officials pointed to a 15-hour Texas Senate Business and Commerce Committee hearing Wednesday, where hundreds of landowners from across the state pleaded for relief from data center developments. The meeting was the latest warning sign for Republicans, who face mounting pressure to balance pro-business policies with rural land use concerns.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s clear the overwhelming number of witnesses in rural Texas are not supportive of the current process,\u201d Patrick said in a statement<\/a>. \u201cThey want it paused. Some want it stopped entirely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schwertner and Patrick argued that transmission companies need to go back to the drawing board and that lawmakers must overhaul the process of how long-distance power line projects are approved. Patrick presides over the state Senate, while Schwertner chairs the Business and Commerce Committee.<\/p>\n

But pausing the transmission build-out could have a huge impact on data center developers looking to put projects in Texas, which may overtake Virginia as the data center capital of the world<\/a> in the coming years.<\/p>\n

Plans to bring the next wave of data centers online are underpinned by assumptions that new extra-high voltage transmission lines will get built within the timeline approved by the PUC.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis could throw a massive wrench into the whole works right now,\u201d said Joshua Rhodes, a research scientist focused on energy at the University of Texas, Austin.<\/p>\n

The transmission decision will be up to PUC commissioners, all five of whom were appointed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott. Abbott and Patrick are both up for reelection in November, and the governor has called in recent months for more oversight of data centers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear how Abbott may seek to influence any transmission plans at the PUC. Neither Abbott nor the PUC responded Friday to a request for comment about lawmakers\u2019 calls to pause the transmission projects.<\/p>\n

A pause would affect the state\u2019s massive oil and gas industry.<\/p>\n

The first of the $33 billion of transmission projects was meant to funnel power to West Texas to help support oil and gas production. The Permian region across Texas and New Mexico accounted for about 44 percent of U.S. oil production and 19 percent of natural gas output last December, according to federal data<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The industry for years has been lobbying Texas to build more transmission lines to the Permian after hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and other techniques sent production skyrocketing. Electricity is needed for those advanced operations, and data center plans would only add to the power demand in Texas.<\/p>\n

\u201cPart of this [problem] is because [transmission] wasn\u2019t built when it was needed,\u201d said Todd Staples, president of the Texas Oil and Gas Association. \u201cNo one believed that oil and gas was going to grow 430 percent in production in the Permian Basin since 2015 to 2025.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Not an academic exercise\u2019
\n\"TransmissionTransmission towers are pictured in Texas, which has been working to add new power lines. | Brandon Bell\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

State lawmakers passed HB 5066 in 2023<\/a>, requiring the PUC to develop a reliability plan for the Permian Basin \u2014 a plan that must address extending transmission to oil and gas production areas.<\/p>\n

The law also requires the PUC to develop reliability plans for any regions with rapid electrical load growth, as determined by transmission service providers.<\/p>\n

The Permian Basin Reliability Plan was approved by the PUC in October 2024.<\/p>\n

Before HB 5066, ERCOT relied on independent and in-house modeling \u2014 along with some data from transmission service providers \u2014 to come up with transmission plans.<\/p>\n

At Wednesday\u2019s hearing, ERCOT Chief Operating Officer Woody Rickerson said HB 5066 requires the grid manager to rely on transmission companies\u2019 data for the Permian Basin Reliability Plan and other transmission projects.<\/p>\n

He said demand forecasts from those providers were \u201csubstantially higher\u201d than ERCOT\u2019s in-house forecasts.<\/p>\n

Transmission service providers earn a guaranteed rate of return on the transmission projects they build, and the bigger and more expensive a project is, the more profit they make.<\/p>\n

In response to questions from POLITICO, ERCOT spokesperson Trudi Webster said the grid operator \u201cstands behind its planning analysis to reliably serve the future of the Permian Basin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rickerson said West Texas needs the transmission lines laid out in the Permian Basin Reliability Plan to avoid power shortages.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith or without [HB] 5066 \u2026 [the proposed transmission] lines are necessary for the stability of the grid, reliability of the grid and supplying West Texas,\u201d Rickerson said.<\/p>\n

In a statement, the Association of Electric Companies of Texas said it continues \u201cto support the development of much-needed electric infrastructure to support Texas\u2019 growing population, as well as our economic demand.\u201d<\/p>\n

Staples with the Texas Oil and Gas Association said Wednesday that the industry will struggle to keep production high if the power lines aren\u2019t built.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not an academic exercise,\u201d he said. \u201cThese are real people with a real crisis that is occurring that we have to fix.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, the Permian Basin is just part of the $33 billion transmission build-out.<\/p>\n

Using demand forecast data from transmission providers, ERCOT determined more transmission would be needed in East Texas. Ultimately, the PUC approved the Strategic Transmission Expansion Plan that envisions new transmission lines built from northeast Texas to just north of Corpus Christi.<\/p>\n

The so-called STEP program within Texas also connects certain eastern transmission projects to Central Texas and the Permian Basin lines with even more transmission.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, it\u2019s not just the Permian reliability plan \u2014 it\u2019s all over Texas,\u201d said state Sen. Kevin Sparks, a Republican from the Permian region, at Wednesday\u2019s meeting. \u201cIt\u2019s coming to a city near you if it hasn\u2019t affected you yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018I\u2019m very disappointed\u2019
\n\"TanyaTanya Tucker, pictured in 2023, spoke and sang last week at a meeting in Austin, Texas, about transmission lines. | Theo Wargo\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

The Permian Basin reliability plans are the first transmission projects to start the siting process under the state\u2019s new power line push. And that process has infuriated rural landowners near their paths.<\/p>\n

Part of their frustration stems from HB 5066, which also cut the timelines for the PUC to approve or deny transmission project from one year to 180 days. That gives landowners less time to argue for other routes that would bypass their land.<\/p>\n

More than 200 people spoke out against the process to fight the transmission lines at Wednesday\u2019s hearing in Austin, Texas, including country music legend Tanya Tucker. She belted out the chorus of her 1978 hit \u201cTexas (When I Die).\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very disappointed in how this has been handled,\u201d Tucker said. \u201cThis isn\u2019t the way we do things in Texas. You don\u2019t rush in and turn someone\u2019s life upside down.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pushback against the lines has been so intense that multiple senators at Wednesday\u2019s hearing called for stopping the build-out until the state Legislature can weigh in on the issue.<\/p>\n

The PUC delayed a vote<\/a> on one of the transmission lines in June. Chair Thomas Gleeson said the commission should consider consolidating Permian Basin Reliability Plan projects and deciding whether to approve them all at once.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to be mindful of the decisions we\u2019re making,\u201d Gleeson said at a PUC meeting in June.<\/p>\n

But if the PUC did tell transmission companies to go back to the drawing board, it could jeopardize data center growth.<\/p>\n

Since late December 2025, ERCOT has been making plans to try to allow waves of data centers to come onto the grid.<\/p>\n

Projects in that first wave \u2014 known as Batch Zero \u2014 are set to get their power allocations from ERCOT in April. ERCOT estimates at least 65 gigawatts worth of data center projects will be in Batch Zero, and they\u2019ll get power based on the generation and transmission that\u2019s been planned for the grid between now and 2032.<\/p>\n

But ERCOT\u2019s Webster told POLITICO the grid operator\u2019s outlook assumes all of the transmission projects in the Permian Basin Reliability Plan and the STEP program are built within the timeline approved by the PUC.<\/p>\n

If major power lines are pushed back, that could delay when the data centers in Batch Zero could come online.<\/p>\n

It could take months for the fight to play out if the PUC were to deny the current transmission applications while telling transmission companies to rework their routes, said Rhodes with the University of Texas.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ll probably argue about it all legislative session,\u201d Rhodes said. \u201cIt could be a very big deal because it could delay it just a few months but it could delay it indefinitely. It could be death by a thousand cuts and they don\u2019t get built, and we lose the ability to modernize the grid.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Powerful Texas Republicans are asking state regulators to pause a $33 billion transmission build-out \u2014 a move that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396321,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-396320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}