One of the subsidiaries of Oklahoma-based ONE Gas was hit with a recent fine of more than $27,000 by Kansas regulators.
The Kansas Corporation Commission issued the fine against Kansas Gas Service for violating state law as well as state and federal regulations. Regulators found the utility guilty of 25 violations of the Kansas underground Utility Damage Prevention Act. The violations? The company failed to mark buried gas lines, reported the Topeka Capital-Journal.
“Between January and December of 2025, there were at least 25 instances the company failed to provide or improperly provided excavators with the location of buried facilities before excavation began and resulted in gas line damages,” state KCC litigation attorney Ahsan Latif who added,” The order assesses penalties of $1,100 for each violation totaling $27,500.
Kansas Gas Service didn’t fight the fines nor the findings of the staff. Most of the violations were reported to be in the Kansas City and Wichita metros with one in Topeka and a few in rural areas.
Corporation Commissioner Annie Kuether commented, “I’m a little sensitive to this because my daughter’s home blew up because of not (locating buried utilities) in Missouri to be fair, but still. I understand the responsibility and it’s great. So we’ve got to do better.”
Staff at the KCC issued 475 notices of probably non-compliance to Kansas Gas Service between 2021 and 2025 and 65 were in the last year, reported the Capital-Journal.
Attorney Latiff explained, “Staff does not recommend penalties for each notice sent out. They review the responses from the company and look into each of those on a case-by-case basis.”
Corporation Commissioner Andrew French, of Lenexa complimented staff for “staying on top of” the issue of unmarked lines.
“Even if it’s rare, even if it’s less than 1% of the time, that could still be an unacceptable number of missed locate requests. So I think it is appropriate to keep tracking this carefully and determine if there is more we can do to ensure compliance.”
The same day that Kansas Gas Service was hit with the $27,500 in fines, Atmos Energy received $11,000 in fines for similar violations. AT&T was fined $60,000 last year by the Corporation Commission.
ONE Gas provides natural gas distribution services to more than 2.3 million customers in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. Headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma, its divisions include Kansas Gas Service, the largest natural gas distributor in Kansas; Oklahoma Natural Gas, the largest in the state; and Texas Gas Service, the third largest in the state in terms of customers.
Its largest natural gas distribution markets by customer count are Oklahoma City and Tulsa, Oklahoma; Kansas City, Wichita and Topeka, Kansas; and Austin and El Paso, Texas. ONE Gas serves residential, commercial, industrial, transportation and wholesale customers in all three states.