West Virginia

HB 2014: certified microgrid and high impact data center program; local preemption

Enacted legislation or regulation

In effect This instrument is recorded as currently in effect as of the dataset date.

Scope

Enrolled Committee Substitute for House Bill 2014 (2025 West Virginia Acts chapter 112) amended W. Va. Code 5B-2-21 (Certified Microgrid Development Program) and added 5B-2-21a (High Impact Data Center Program and Commerce certification) and 5B-2-21b. Section 5B-2-21b(c) prohibits counties and municipalities from enacting or enforcing ordinances, regulations or rules that limit the creation, construction, development, expansion or operation of any certified microgrid district or certified high impact data center project, and 5B-2-21b(d) says those certified projects may not be subject to county or municipal zoning, noise, viewshed, lighting, development or land use ordinances, building permitting or license requirements. The preemption applies only to projects the Secretary of Commerce has certified.

Geographic scope
West Virginia
Jurisdiction
State
Authority type
Legislature
Issuing authority
West Virginia Legislature

Dates

Adopted
30 April 2025
Effective
11 July 2025
Scheduled expiration
See completion condition
Ended
Not recorded as ended
Completion condition
The opened sections state no expiration. The separate article 11-6N in the same act sunsets on 31 December 2055; that sunset is not part of this record.
Source document
The source page states no document date
Last checked
23 September 2026 (earlier than tracker date 5 October 2026; not an automatic status change)

Summary

West Virginia House Bill 2014 of 2025 created a Department of Commerce certification path for microgrid districts and high impact data centers and, for certified projects only, displaced county and municipal zoning, land-use, noise, lighting, building-permit and license requirements. The enrolled text says the act passed on 12 April 2025 and took effect 90 days from passage, on 11 July 2025; the official bill history records the Governor's approval on 30 April 2025 and chapter 112 of the 2025 Acts. The act does not certify any named project, and uncertified data centers remain subject to local rules.

What this does not establish

  • This record covers the microgrid, high impact data center certification and local-preemption provisions (5B-2-21, 5B-2-21a, 5B-2-21b). The same enrolled act also created article 11-6N, which is the separate record wv-2025-hb2014-11-6n-hidc-property-tax-distribution.
  • The primary source is the HTML rendering of the enrolled bill on the Legislature site; the 11-6N record cites the PDF rendering of the same enrolled act.
  • The current codified text of chapter 5B was not opened because the Legislature's robots.txt disallows its /WVCODE/ path; no enacted 2026 amendment to these sections appears in the 2026 regular-session bill list, where related 2026 bills are shown pending in committee when the session ended.
  • Which projects the Secretary has certified was not established from an official list.

Unresolved questions

  • Whether pending litigation challenging House Bill 2014 has produced any court ruling was not established; no appellate opinion was found.

Relationships

Supersession means a later instrument replaces the earlier legal effect. Repeal links identify the repeal instrument and the measure it ends. A later implementation or related letter is not treated as a replacement unless the record says so.

Sources

Primary source

https://www.wvlegislature.gov/Bill_Text_HTML/2025_SESSIONS/RS/bills/hb2014%20sub1%20enr.htm

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