Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin signed a bill into law this week to protect the state’s three major Air Force bases from the encroachment of wind farms.
She signed Senate Bill 1576, a measure approved by the state legislature in April. Legislators were warned if the growth of wind farms spread any closer to Tinker, Altus and Vance Air Force bases, the state could be in danger of losing them.
The bill focuses on wind farm growth near military training routes, drop zones and runway approaches. Some legislators claimed the wind farms could negatively affect the aerospace industry by preventing military aircraft from low-level training routes.
Originally, House Bill 3561 was passed in March and prohibited the “construction or operation of a wind energy facility, or facility expansion, from encroaching upon or having a significant adverse impact on the mission, training or operations of any military installation or branch.” But some changes were needed in the bill and eventually, the Senate version, SB 1576 won unanimous approval on April 18.
Under the new law, developers of any planned turbine construction must get agreement for the military or obtain an approved mitigation plan from the Department of Defense Siting Clearinghouse before constructing or expanding a wind energy facility.
The new law not only protects Tinker Air Force base in Oklahoma City, Altus Air Force base in southwest Oklahoma and Vance Air Force base in Enid, but the air space at Fort Sill in Lawton. Fort Sill’s experiments with drones is also protected under the new law.
As the Enid News and Eagle reported this week, the governor’s action to sign the bill into law makes Oklahoma a leader in efforts to protect air bases from wind farm growth.
Mike Cooper, the military liaison for the city of Enid and chairman of the Oklahoma Strategic Military Planning Commission spoke with the newspaper about the law.
“We are one of the first states to have effective airspace protection legislation, to make sure we don’t negatively impact military airspaces, approaches and drop zones,” Cooper said in April. “I can’t tell you how appreciative they are, because they need this done in a lot of places where they fly and train, and they’ll be holding up Oklahoma as the model for how to get that done.”
Cooper credited passage of the legislation to the leadership of the bill’s sponsors, state Senate President Pro Tem Mike Schulz, R-Altus, and State Rep. Charles Ortega, R-Altus, and the collaborative efforts of the military and wind energy industry to find mutually agreeable terms.
Schulz, Ortega, Cooper, state Sen. Adam Pugh, R-Edmond and Brian Bush, president and CEO of the Altus Chamber of Commerce, were on hand for Fallin’s official signing of SB1576 Tuesday.