As PJM Interconnection Executive Vice President Asim Haque, a former chairman of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, appears before the Ohio Senate Energy Committee today, the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA) is urging lawmakers to demand real answers about inflated load forecasts, speculative data center demand and the risk of forcing Ohio customers to pay for power infrastructure based on demand that may never show up.
That risk is not hypothetical. On American Electric Power’s (AEP) second-quarter 2025 earnings call, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Trevor Mihalik told investors that, under AEP’s commercial-load protections, “it doesn’t really matter to us financially whether that load is actually coming on or not.”
“That should stop every lawmaker in Ohio in their tracks,” said Ryan Augsburger, president of the OMA. “If it does not really matter to the utility financially whether the load shows up or not, lawmakers should ask a basic question: who is carrying the risk? Ohio manufacturers and families know the answer. Customers do.”
Ohio has seen what happens when utility narratives go unchallenged. House Bill 6 was sold under the banner of urgency and public need. What followed was corruption, deception and years of fallout for Ohio customers. OMA said lawmakers should remember that history before letting another utility-driven panic campaign shape billion-dollar energy decisions.