A major Ohio electric utility is asking state regulators to loosen its reliability standards, with a hearing scheduled for late February.
Lawmakers say FirstEnergy’s request in front of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio is for its three subsidiaries—Ohio Edison, Cleveland Electric Illuminating and Toledo Edison—to be allowed longer and more frequent electric service outages each year.
Most of the Ohio House Energy committee sent PUCO a letter Wednesday, urging the regulatory committee to shut that down. Rep. David Thomas (R-Jefferson) and Rep. Tristan Rader (D-Lakewood) worked with their colleagues across the aisle on it.
“One of my fears moving forward is this is just the beginning, this is going to set a precedent,” Rader said in an interview Thursday. “If the (PUCO) decides to grant in part or in whole this whole request, you’ll see AEP, you’ll see Duke coming in and asking for similar things.”
Eighteen of his colleagues are joining other critics of the request, including the cities of Lakewood and Barberton and the Ohio Environmental Council (OEC). Lakewood saw a series of outages last summer, which prompted an investigation by PUCO.
In July, that investigation concluded that Cleveland Electric Illuminating, under FirstEnergy, was in “probable non-compliance.”
To remedy its probable non-compliance, Cleveland Electric Illuminating was tasked with several corrective actions—including infrastructure investments and more outage notifications, according to PUCO documents.
In their own letter, the lawmakers say they acknowledge current challenges facing the electric grid, thanks to infrastructure and extreme weather. But they argue the bar shouldn’t be lowered just because of that.
Last year, Gov. Mike DeWine signed House Bill 15, legislation that lawmakers and lobbyists have said will prompt new energy generation and otherwise overhaul the system as power-hungry consumers, like data centers, put increasing pressure on the grid statewide.
The letter cited HB 15, with lawmakers writing they request “the Commission deny FirstEnergy’s request to weaken reliability rules and continue to prioritize strong consumer protections, transparency, and accountability.”
