AEP Ohio

AEP Ohio is the Ohio operating arm of American Electric Power (AEP), the Columbus-based utility giant that serves central and southeastern Ohio. It was never charged in the HB 6 scandal, but it ran a parallel dark-money operation of its own — and in 2026 it sits at the center of the fight over who pays for the electric grid.

What it is

A regulated investor-owned utility, regulated by Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) and a part-owner of the aging OVEC coal plants that HB 6 subsidized — making it a direct beneficiary of the bailout that sent FirstEnergy to court.

The dark-money architecture

• AEP funds a 501(c)(4) called Empowering Ohio's Economy (EOE). CEO Nicholas Akins admitted on an August 2020 earnings call that AEP had put $8.7 million into it from 2015–2019, effectively all its funding — per the Energy and Policy Institute.
• EOE routed money to the same network behind HB 6: $700,000 to Generation Now (2017–2019), $2 million-plus to a reserve group called Open Road Path, $500,000 to a "Coalition for Term Limits" pushing to extend a Speaker's tenure, and $50,000 to "Liberty Ohio" for primary attacks on Republicans who crossed leadership.

The grid cost-shift (2026)

• AEP and FirstEnergy formed a joint venture, Grid Growth Ohio, for a roughly $1.1 billion high-voltage transmission build.
• Grid operator PJM Interconnection found the plan would push about 60% of that cost onto residential ratepayers, even though the demand driving it comes from data centers and AI facilities. Rep. Sean Patrick Brennan (D-Parma) and the Ohio Consumers' Counsel formally objected at the Statehouse and before federal regulators.
• AEP CEO Bill Fehrman's 2025 compensation reached about $36.6 million — the highest-paid U.S. utility executive, roughly $8 million above the next (Southern Co.'s Christopher Womack) — as residential bills climbed (Ohio Capital Journal / Energy and Policy Institute).

Relationships

• Named in John J. Kulewicz's June 2026 ethics complaint: JobsOhio board chair Josh Rubin's lobbying firm counts AEP as a client while JobsOhio floats a $100M nuclear-for-data-centers fund — see JobsOhio.
• Partners with FirstEnergy in Grid Growth Ohio; regulated by Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO).

Why it matters in 2026

• The Ohio 2026 Attorney General Race (Keith Faber vs. John J. Kulewicz) turns partly on the AEP/JobsOhio conflict Kulewicz is running on.
• The Ohio 2026 Governor Race decides who appoints the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) commissioners who rule on AEP's rates and the grid cost-shift.