Overview of Texas Amendments to Use of Unmanned Aircraft Statute

The 85th Legislative Session brought an amendment to the law related to use of unmanned aircraft in Texas.  Importantly for agriculture, the amendment adds confined animal feeding operations (“CAFOs”) to the list of “critical infrastructure” facilities to which additional flight limitations apply for many drone operators.  The amendment will go into effect on September 1, 2017. This post will review, in detail, the current Use of Unmanned Aircraft statute and discuss the most recent amendment.  For those of you not concerned with the specific details, the “Take Away Points” sections at the end of the post will summarize the key points of the post and save you some time. As of September 1, 2017, House Bill 1643 will make three key changes to the Use of Unmanned Aircraft statute.First, there will be modifications to the “critical infrastructure” definition.Of interest for agriculture, the definition will now include “a concentrated animal feeding operation.”  This is defined as “a concentrated, confined livestock or poultry facility that is operated for meat, milk, or egg production or for growing, stabling, or housing livestock or poultry in pens or houses, in which livestock or poultry are fed at the place of confinement and crop or forage growth or feed is not produced in the confinement area.”Another addition that could be important for rural landowners with oil or gas production on their property is that the definition will include an oil or gas drilling site, a group of tanks used to store crude oil, an oil, gas or chemical production facility, an oil or gas wellhead, or any oil or gas facility with an active flare so long as enclosed by a fence or other physical barrier obviously designed to exclude intruders.Additionally, “any structure used as part of a system to provide wired or wireless telecommunications services” is added to the critical infrastructure definition.