South Dakota HOA Solar Rights

Section 1: Overview — Solar rights for HOAs in South Dakota

South Dakota doesn't limit a community association's ability to prohibit or restrict solar energy systems through its declaration or CC&Rs; the South Dakota Codified Laws (SDCL) contain no statute voiding declaration-based solar prohibitions. What South Dakota does have is a voluntary solar easement act in SDCL Chapter 43-13, which lets a property owner acquire a recorded easement for sunlight access across a neighboring parcel by agreement between consenting owners.¹ It doesn't override an association's authority over installations within the community. Utility-side matters stay separate: South Dakota has no statewide net-metering mandate, and distributed-generation compensation is a utility-customer question handled by the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission, not a limit on association governance.² On governing framework, condominiums that elect coverage fall under the South Dakota condominium statute in SDCL Chapter 43-15A,³ while planned-community HOAs answer to their recorded CC&Rs, the South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act, and common law.⁴ Nationally, this places South Dakota in the solar-easement-only category: it enables voluntary easements but grants no owner the right to install solar over an association's objection. The sections that follow set out the statutory framework, what associations can and cannot do, and recent legislative and judicial activity.

Section 2: The statutory framework

2A. Solar-access provision (or its absence)

South Dakota has no solar-access statute. After review of SDCL Title 43 (Property) and the Code generally, no provision limits or voids declaration-based prohibitions or restrictions on solar energy systems, and no provision requires an association to permit solar or caps the restrictions an association may impose.⁵ This absence carries a direct consequence: an association's authority over a solar installation is set by its recorded declaration and, for condominiums, the applicable condominium statute, not by any solar-specific restriction-override. Where a declaration prohibits or conditions rooftop modifications, that prohibition governs a solar installation the same way it governs any other exterior alteration, subject only to the general contract and equitable doctrines that South Dakota courts apply to restrictive covenants.

The utility-side boundary deserves a clear line. South Dakota stands as one of a small number of states without a statewide net-metering policy; the PUC has declined to adopt a mandatory net-metering rule, and distributed-generation compensation gets negotiated with the serving utility.² The PUC's siting jurisdiction reaches only solar farms with a capacity of 100 megawatts or more, and smaller projects aren't regulated by the commission.⁶ Those matters concern the relationship between a customer and a utility. They don't create, enlarge, or limit an association's authority over whether and how an owner may install solar within the community, and they shouldn't be read as solar-access protection.

2B. The solar easement act and the governing framework

South Dakota has a voluntary solar easement act within SDCL Chapter 43-13, Easements and Servitudes. SDCL 43-13-16.1 defines a solar easement as "a right, whether or not stated in the form of a restriction, option to obtain an easement, easement, covenant, or condition, in any deed, will, or other instrument executed by or on behalf of any owner of land or air space for the purpose of ensuring adequate exposure of a photovoltaic solar power system to the sun."¹ SDCL 43-13-17 provides that such an easement gets created in writing, gets recorded in the office of the register of deeds, runs with the land benefited and burdened, and states that "the term of any such easement may not exceed fifty years"; it also voids the easement if no development has occurred within five years after the effective date.⁷ SDCL 43-13-18 sets out required contents, including a description of the burdened and benefited parcels and the angles and distances defining the protected access.⁸ This is an instrument two consenting owners may adopt; it doesn't give a unit owner a right to install solar over an association's objection, and it doesn't void a declaration's solar restriction. The chapter treats wind and solar in parallel provisions, but the solar-access mechanism operates the same way regardless of the wind language.

The governing framework for associations runs as follows. Condominiums that expressly elect coverage by recording a master deed answer to the South Dakota condominium statute at SDCL Chapter 43-15A.³ Planned-community HOAs have no comprehensive South Dakota HOA statute; they answer to their recorded CC&Rs, the South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act at SDCL Chapter 47-22 and following, where the association incorporates as a nonprofit, and common law.⁴ South Dakota Chapter 43-15B covers Time-Share Estates, not a planned-community act, and South Dakota is not a Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act state.⁹ UCIOA features shouldn't be attributed to it.

2C. The role of CC&Rs and architectural review

Because there is no restriction-override, the recorded declaration and any architectural-review provisions stand as the operative rules for solar. The order of precedence runs straightforward: a restriction-override statute, if one existed, would control over conflicting declaration provisions; absent one, the declaration controls, subject to the general contract and equitable doctrines South Dakota courts apply to covenants and, for condominiums, the condominium statute. Architectural review therefore does most of the work. In a planned community, the declaration typically vests an architectural-control committee or the board with authority to approve or condition exterior modifications, and a solar installation gets reviewed on the terms the declaration supplies. In a condominium, the analysis turns on the boundary between the unit and the common elements: a roof or exterior wall ordinarily counts as a common element or limited common element under the master deed, so an installation touching those areas generally requires association approval on the master deed's terms. South Dakota case law confirms that an architectural committee's discretion stays bounded by the governing instrument and cannot be expanded by rules the committee adopts outside the amendment procedure the declaration requires.¹⁰

Section 3: What a South Dakota HOA can and cannot do regarding solar

Because South Dakota has no restriction-override, the following turns on governing-document and applicable-statute authority. Nothing below should be read to imply a statutory obligation to permit solar or a statutory cap on restrictions.

A. Approval and architectural review

A solar installation is subject to whatever architectural-review authority the declaration grants, and in a planned community that authority typically sits with an architectural-control committee or the board — grounded in the declaration, reaching planned communities and condominiums, and mandatory where the declaration so provides. In Countryside South Homeowners Ass'n, Inc. v. Nedved, 2007 S.D. 70, 737 N.W.2d 280, the South Dakota Supreme Court held that a committee "exceeded its powers when it adopted the new rules and denied the homeowner's request based solely on those rules," reversing enforcement of a shed-size rule the committee had adopted without following the declaration's amendment procedure.¹⁰

B. Permissible and impermissible restrictions

There is no statutory cap on the restrictions a South Dakota association may impose on solar; the declaration's terms and general equitable doctrines set the limits.⁵ An association may prohibit or condition rooftop and exterior installations to the extent its declaration authorizes, and a restriction gets analyzed as a contract that courts presume enforceable unless a recognized defense applies.

C. Governing-document and disclosure considerations

Solar rules typically appear in the declaration's use restrictions and architectural provisions, and amendments get adopted by the vote the declaration and, for nonprofits, the Nonprofit Corporation Act require.⁴ On resale, SDCL 43-4-44.1 requires a seller of residential real property governed by a homeowners' association to furnish the buyer, before a written offer, a disclosure that the property is governed by an association and a copy of the governing documents, which is where any solar restriction would surface. This mandatory disclosure requirement reaches HOA-governed residential property.¹¹

D. Dispute resolution and remedies

Solar disputes get litigated as covenant-enforcement or declaratory-judgment actions in the South Dakota Circuit Court, the trial court of general jurisdiction, with appeal directly to the South Dakota Supreme Court, the only appellate court in the state.¹² There is no solar-specific statutory remedy or fee-shifting provision; attorney fees and remedies follow the declaration and general South Dakota law, and equitable relief such as an injunction stays available on the terms courts apply to covenants.

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills

No bill in the South Dakota Legislature's 2025 or 2026 sessions created or amended a provision affecting an association's or a restrictive covenant's authority over residential rooftop solar. The solar-related legislation introduced in the relevant window ran utility-side. For example, 2025 Senate Bill 108 would have reduced the megawatt threshold, from 100 MW to 50 MW, at which large energy-conversion facilities fall under PUC siting jurisdiction under SDCL Chapter 49-41B; it was sent to the 41st legislative day, effectively killed, on a 5-4 committee vote and didn't concern association authority over rooftop installations.¹³ Because there is no qualifying HOA-solar bill, no metadata block or audience table appears for this subsection.

B. Recent appellate rulings

No South Dakota Supreme Court decision in the past 36 months addressed association architectural authority as applied specifically to solar. The most relevant recent covenant-enforcement decision is Hood v. Straatmeyer, which didn't involve solar but bears directly on how covenants are enforced.

C. Active legislative debates

There is no active, publicly tracked proposal in the South Dakota Legislature to enact solar-access protection limiting association or covenant authority over residential solar.

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

Solar-rights law across the states falls into three broad categories. First are strong-protection states whose statutes void or limit association solar restrictions, including California, Civ. Code § 714; Florida, Fla. Stat. § 163.04; Arizona, A.R.S. § 33-1816; Colorado, C.R.S. § 38-30-168; Nevada; and Texas, Prop. Code § 202.010. Second are solar-easement-only states, which authorize voluntary sunlight-access easements between owners but don't override associations. Third are no-protection states, where the declaration fully controls. South Dakota belongs in the second category: its solar easement act enables voluntary easements but supplies no restriction-override, and a solar easement act alone doesn't confer strong-protection status. For multi-state operators, this means a South Dakota portfolio is governed by each community's declaration rather than a state solar mandate, so playbooks written for California or Texas don't transfer. Legislative momentum toward HOA solar protection in South Dakota stays absent, with no qualifying bill in the 2025 or 2026 sessions.

HOA Weekly's South Dakota Solar Rights coverage updates quarterly as the legislature and the South Dakota Supreme Court act. No federal rule comparable to the FCC's OTARD rule extends to rooftop solar, so South Dakota's state law controls here.

Footnotes

1. SDCL 43-13-16.1, Solar easement defined (South Dakota Codified Laws) ↩
2. South Dakota Public Utilities Commission, Compensation (net metering not adopted) ↩
3. SDCL Chapter 43-15A, Condominiums (South Dakota Codified Laws) ↩
4. SDCL Chapter 47-22, South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act ↩
5. SDCL Title 43, Property (chapter list; no solar restriction-override provision) ↩
6. South Dakota Public Utilities Commission, Solar Energy FAQ (100 MW siting threshold) ↩
7. SDCL 43-13-17, Granting of wind or solar easements--Recording--Maximum term ↩
8. SDCL 43-13-18, Contents of wind or solar easement instruments ↩
9. SDCL Title 43 chapter index (43-15B is Time-Share Estates) ↩
10. Countryside South Homeowners Ass'n, Inc. v. Nedved, 2007 S.D. 70, 737 N.W.2d 280 ↩
11. SDCL 43-4-44.1, Additional disclosure--Residential real property under a homeowners' association ↩
12. South Dakota Unified Judicial System (Circuit Courts; South Dakota Supreme Court as sole appellate court) ↩
13. 2025 South Dakota Senate Bill 108 (energy-conversion facility megawatt threshold, chapter 49-41B) ↩
14. Hood v. Straatmeyer, 2025 S.D. 12, 18 N.W.3d 649 (opinion, South Dakota Unified Judicial System) ↩