Wildfire plans and tree clearing in Wyoming: House Bill 192, the Public Service Commission and Black Hills Energy's plan

This page reports what the official source says. It is not legal advice: ask the office named here. It restates three documents as read on October 9, 2026: Enrolled Act No. 58 of the 2025 General Session of the Wyoming Legislature (House Bill 192) and the Legislative Service Office summary of it, the Wildfire Mitigation page of the Wyoming Public Service Commission, and the Wildfire Mitigation Plan that Black Hills Energy updated in June 2026. The side by side with other regions is on the guide to utility wildfire plans and tree clearing.

What the Wyoming act requires

The act creates a new article 4 of Wyoming Statutes title 37 chapter 3, called Wildfire Mitigation, sections 37-3-401 to 37-3-405. The Legislative Service Office summary gives the effective date as July 1, 2025, with the rulemaking provisions effective immediately, and the session law chapter as 119. It defines an electric utility to include cooperative utilities and to exclude utilities owned or operated by a city or town.

Section 37-3-403 says each electric utility must prepare a plan that includes at least these items:

A description of its service territory and the areas or rights-of-way that may face a heightened wildfire risk.
The procedures, standards and schedules for inspecting and operating its transmission and distribution lines.
The procedures and standards it will use to perform vegetation management.
Proposed upgrades and preventative programs, and how its wildfire strategies changed over the preceding five years.
Procedures for de-energizing lines and disabling reclosers, with six listed considerations, and for restoring the system after a fire.
Incremental costs and rate impacts for utilities whose rates the Commission regulates, community outreach, and input from the state forestry division, an association representing rural firefighters, counties and other fire entities.

Within five business days of filing, the utility must give direct notice to all conservation districts, municipalities and counties in its Wyoming service territory. Under section 37-3-404 the Commission must approve a plan within 120 days of receipt, unless it enters an order for a longer period, if the plan is reasonable, in the public interest and appropriately balances its cost against the risk of a wildfire. Approval does not automatically give a regulated utility the right to recover the cost. Plans are resubmitted no later than every fifth year, and by June 1 of the year after an approval the utility files an annual compliance report and asks for an order finding substantial compliance. Section 37-3-402 says an approved plan preempts any part of a local land use plan or ordinance that would impede carrying it out.

Section 37-3-405 sets a presumption in civil actions that the approved plan is reasonable and prudent preparation for wildfire risk. It lets a plaintiff recover economic loss only by showing that the utility failed to substantially comply with its approved plan, or acted with gross negligence, malice or criminal intent, and that this was the actual and proximate cause of the damage. A utility that tried in good faith to comply but was denied or unreasonably delayed access to a right-of-way for vegetation management or fire mitigation work is deemed to have substantially complied. Actions must be brought within four years of ignition, and noneconomic damages are limited to claims based on injury or death.

What the Commission lists

The Commission's Wildfire Mitigation page is titled Wildfire Mitigation Plans and embeds a dashboard headed Utility Wildfire Plans and Utility Resources and Guidelines. The utilities named in it are PRECORP, WYRulec, Montana-Dakota Utilities, Carbon Power and Light, Lower Valley Energy, Tri-State Generation and Transmission, Bridger Valley Electric, High West Energy, Wheatland REA, Rocky Mountain Power, Fall River, Big Horn and Niobrara. The page text does not give filing dates or approval status, so this page does not either.

Black Hills Energy's plan

Black Hills Energy says its plan, updated in June 2026, covers its three electric utilities, one of which is Wyoming Electric, serving Cheyenne Light, Fuel and Power Company territory. It says the first plan was published in 2024 and the 2025 update added emergency public safety power shutoff protocols. Its vegetation program is described as integrated vegetation management, with work done by third-party contractors on a time and risk basis.

The plan sets cycles of four years, not to exceed five, for distribution facilities and five years for transmission facilities, and says weather, access, landowner engagement, contractor staffing and growth rates can affect timing. It names ANSI A300 Part 1 and the ISA best management practices for utility pruning as guidelines it aligns with where field conditions allow, and says the National Electrical Safety Code generally requires pruning or removal of interfering trees. For lines above 200,000 volts it cites the NERC standard FAC-003, whose table of minimum vegetation clearance distances rises with elevation above sea level; at 230 kV the distance is 4.0 feet from sea level to 500 feet and 5.3 feet at 13,000 to 14,000 feet.

Wildfire plans and tree clearing in Wyoming: House Bill 192, the Public Service Commission and Black Hills Energy's plan

What the Wyoming act requires

What the Commission lists

Black Hills Energy's plan

Sources