The wind farm has been at the center of a legal battle for over a decade. But everything seemed to be resolved last year.
A federal judge ruled in late 2023 that Enel had trespassed and misused Osage resources.
Beyond millions of dollars in fines, in 2024, the court ordered windy company Enel to remove the wind farm and restore the land by the end of 2025 — a task the company said would cost $260 million.
On Monday, U.S. Court of International Trade Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves temporarily paused the order to remove the wind farm. At the same time, the company that owns it, Enel, appeals the decision. However, Enel has 14 days to post a $10 million bond as a condition for the delay, allowing them to keep the wind farm in place while they fight the ruling in court.
It’s the latest twist in a years-long battle.
Three interrelated companies that are all part of Enel leased land in 2010 to build 84 wind turbines. The lease covered 84,000 acres of surface land in Osage County, not the earth and minerals underneath. However, the companies dug huge holes at the base of each turbine and used some of the excavated rocks as backfill.
The legal fight began in 2014 when the Osage Minerals Council, an arm of the Osage Nation that owns and manages all the mineral rights in Osage County, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office sued, arguing that Enel’s excavation — done with explosives — was mining, which required a permit the company never obtained.
The judge ordered the company to pay nearly $4 million in damages and legal fees. While Enel claimed they owed just $69,000, the U.S. Attorney’s Office estimated damages at $38 million. In December 2024, the judge ordered Enel to pay nearly $68,000 for trespass and $243,000 for misuse of Osage resources. Enel also owes nearly $2 million each to the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Osage Mineral Council to cover legal fees and costs for the decade-long case.
Enel argued that removing the turbines would cost $36 million and secured a smaller bond of about $5 million for the damages. The Osage Minerals Council and the federal government wanted the company to post a much larger bond — $50 million — but the judge decided that was too much and set it at $10 million instead. The last time Enel appealed a matter in the case, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver took a little more than three years to issue a ruling.
“Though a bond is appropriate to secure Plaintiff’s and Plaintiff-Intervenor’s interests while the injunction is stayed, the Court is not convinced that the full amount of $50,000,000.00 is necessary in this case,” Choe-Groves wrote. “The Court’s judgment also serves as a form of security to ensure that the wind farm will be removed if the appeal is unsuccessful and there has been no showing that Defendants would be unable to comply with the Court’s judgment.”
Osage Minerals Council Chairman Myron Red Eagle said he knows “as much as everyone else” at this stage.
This report was produced by the Oklahoma Public Media Exchange, a collaboration of public media organizations. Help support collaborative journalism by donating at the link at the top of this webpage.
