HB1373 creates the Commercial Solar Facility Decommissioning Act, a new set of rules governing the end-of-life removal of commercial solar projects on leased land. The bill applies to solar power facilities that qualify as generation assets and defines key terms such as grantee, solar power facility, solar energy device, and solar power facility agreement. It also voids any contract term that tries to waive the grantee’s duties under the act and allows injured parties to seek injunctive relief, while preserving other remedies available under law.
The bill requires solar lease agreements to place decommissioning responsibilities on the grantee, including removal of solar devices, transformers, substations, buried cables, and certain overhead lines, plus restoration of disturbed land. At the landowner’s request, and in some cases if reasonable, the grantee must also remove roads, rocks, and other debris, and help return the property to a tillable or otherwise near-original condition. Landowners must make certain restoration requests within 180 days after the facility stops producing commercially or after notice of intent to decommission.
HB1373 also requires financial assurance to secure decommissioning obligations. Acceptable forms include a parent company guaranty, letter of credit, bond, or another landowner-acceptable form, and the amount must cover estimated removal and restoration costs minus salvage value and certain pledged debt value. Those estimates must be prepared and updated by a licensed Oklahoma professional engineer, and the grantee must keep the financial assurance sufficient over time and deliver it by the earlier of contract termination or the twentieth anniversary of commercial operations. The grantee bears the costs of obtaining and maintaining this assurance.
The bill’s impact on state law is to add a new statutory framework in Title 17 for commercial solar facility decommissioning, shifting more explicit cleanup, restoration, and financial security obligations onto solar developers and operators leasing private land. It is likely to affect solar project contracts, landowners, lenders, and developers by standardizing minimum decommissioning terms and limiting the ability of parties to contract around them. The act becomes effective November 1, 2025.
The overall sentiment around the bill appears strongly favorable and noncontroversial in the legislative process. It advanced unanimously through House committee, House floor, Senate committee, and Senate floor votes, with no recorded opposition in the provided history. The main policy emphasis is protecting landowners and ensuring that solar facilities are properly removed and the land restored, while the principal point of potential contention is the cost and administrative burden placed on grantees, including ongoing financial assurance and engineering estimate requirements.
HB1373 adds a new chapter of law in Title 17 governing commercial solar facility decommissioning. It makes certain waiver provisions in solar lease agreements void, authorizes injunctive relief, requires specific removal and land-restoration obligations, and mandates financial assurance to secure those obligations. The bill directly affects solar developers/operators leasing land from private landowners, as well as contract drafting, project financing, and end-of-life cleanup obligations for commercial solar facilities.
The bill appears to have broad bipartisan support and little visible opposition. It passed every recorded committee and floor vote unanimously or near-unanimously, including 94-0 in the House and 44-0 in the Senate. The voting history suggests the measure was viewed as a practical landowner-protection and cleanup measure rather than a controversial policy change.
No formal opposition is reflected in the provided votes or transcripts, but the likely area of tension is between landowner protections and developer costs. The bill requires grantees to fund and maintain financial assurance, obtain periodic third-party engineering estimates, and perform extensive removal and restoration work, which could be viewed by solar developers and project financiers as increasing project costs and contractual risk. Landowners, by contrast, benefit from stronger statutory protections and clearer decommissioning standards.