See these posts.
http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.orgmode/81330
http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.orgmode/81364
If Org is run from Vanilla Emacs then setting then setting that to
`org-odt-data-dir' to nil should work (I think).
The primary consumer of `org-odt-data-dir' is a package distributor who
distributes a STANDALONE org. He can set this variable to the location
in the file system where he has dumped the styles file.
>From the archives:
http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-orgmode/2012-01/msg00020.html
Glenn Morris <r...@gnu.org> writes:
> Package: emacs,org-mode
> Version: 24.3.50
>
> This refers to the version of Org mode in Emacs trunk.
>
> ./src/emacs -Q -l ox-odt
> C-h v org-odt-data-dir
> -> Its value is "/usr/share/emacs/etc/org"
>
> This value is hard-coded (and autoloaded; why?) in org-version.el.
> This value makes no sense.
> For Emacs, it should be something based on data-directory.
>
> This was pointed out before in some moderately lengthy discussion:
>
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2012-10/msg00002.html
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2012-10/msg00070.html
>
> (In general, the setting of directory-related variables in ox-odt seems
> rather over-engineered.)
