A Wagoner County district judge has ordered county commissioners to grant a conditional-use permit for a nearly 5,000-acre solar farm near Porter, reversing a decision commissioners made in a single vote after five separate open meetings. District Judge Doug Kirkley’s ruling clears a major legal hurdle for Persica Solar, the company behind the proposed array in northeast Oklahoma, though the permit comes with conditions the county is still allowed to impose.
A 16-Month Fight Over a $336 Million Project
The legal battle traces back to June 2025, when the Wagoner County Commission voted against granting Persica Solar’s conditional-use permit, according to Oklahoma Energy Today. Before that single denial vote, the request had appeared on the commission’s published agenda five separate times, and commissioners held five separate open meetings, per the same outlet. Persica Solar later filed a trial brief asking the courts to issue the permit outright, pushing the dispute into Kirkley’s courtroom.
The scale of the proposal explains why it drew so much scrutiny. The project is described as a proposed 5,000-acre solar development in northeast Oklahoma, with an estimated construction cost of $336 million, according to the earlier reporting. Persica Solar said it had obtained voluntary leases from 25 separate property owners and that power generated at the site would be injected into the grid through Public Service Company of Oklahoma before being distributed to the Southwest Power Pool.
Judge's Ruling Limits, But Doesn't Eliminate, County Control
In his ruling, Kirkley found that a conditional-use permit cannot be denied solely because the proposed use is not affirmatively beneficial to the community, so long as the applicant satisfies the ordinance's conditions. That legal standard effectively reversed the commission's earlier decision. At the same time, the ruling preserves some local authority: the Wagoner County Board of County Commissioners may still impose reasonable conditions on Persica Solar's permit going forward.
Persica Solar had previously said it anticipated entering a road-maintenance agreement to address damage from equipment hauling, with a commitment to leave roads in as good or better condition than before construction. The company also told the Tulsa World that the solar arrays themselves would stand roughly 10 to 12 feet above ground at their highest point and would be enclosed by fencing, according to the Tulsa World.
NextEra Touts Jobs, Tax Revenue, and Landowner Payments
NextEra Energy Resources, tied to the Persica project, welcomed the judge's ruling. The company has said the project is expected to generate approximately $31 million in tax revenue and create hundreds of construction jobs, framing the array as a long-term investment in the region that also provides lease payments to landowners supporting local family farms. In a company statement, Marshall Hastings said NextEra Energy Resources looks forward to partnering with landowners, community leaders, and citizens to build the project.
Those figures track closely with what Persica Solar told county officials during the permitting fight, when the company said the project could create up to 300 construction jobs at the height of construction and generate approximately $31 million in Wagoner County ad valorem tax revenue over the project's 30-year life, per Oklahoma Energy Today's earlier coverage. One county project document had also stated that no battery energy storage system was included in the conditional-use permit then under consideration, though that detail was tied specifically to the permit under review at the time and hasn't been confirmed as part of the court's final order.
Part of a Broader Solar Push Across Oklahoma
The Porter dispute lands amid a rapid expansion of solar power statewide. Oklahoma's total solar capacity reached 842 megawatts by the end of 2025, enough to power about 105,000 homes, according to KOSU — more than double the under-400-megawatt total the state had in 2024. PV Magazine USA reported that Oklahoma was among fifteen states where solar capacity grew by more than 50% in 2024, even as the state still ranked near the bottom nationally for solar capacity and drew only a small fraction of its electricity from the sun, per PV Magazine USA.
Other recent Oklahoma solar projects echo Persica's projected benefits almost exactly. NextEra Energy separately broke ground on a 250-megawatt Oklahoma solar project tied to a power-purchase agreement with food distributor Sysco, estimating about $32 million in tax revenue over 30 years and roughly 300 construction jobs — numbers PV Magazine USA reported are nearly identical to what Persica promised Wagoner County. The Kiowa County Solar Project near Snyder also became operational in 2025, adding 100 megawatts of generation, the outlet noted.
Not every renewable project in the state has found such success. Oklahoma Watch reported that the state's Commissioners of the Land Office voted down several wind and solar leases on state-owned land over the past year, potentially forgoing millions of dollars earmarked for public education, while a Senate bill on wind-turbine setbacks stalled after the chamber declined to take up a House-amended version requiring half-mile buffers from homes, according to Oklahoma Watch. Commissioners elsewhere in the state also voted 4-0 to reject an EDF Renewables solar project in Payne County over concerns about lease length, the same report found.
