Mark Williams|The Columbus Dispatch
AEP officials told state regulators Wednesday they had just minutes to decide which 150,000 Franklin County customers would lose power last month.
As demand for electricity surged after powerful storms ripped through Ohio and wreaked havoc to American Electric Power Ohio's transmission and distribution systems, the company was given just five minutes to decide which neighborhoods would lose their electricity to keep outages from spreading.
The power company also told state regulators there was no way to turn power on and off throughout the city tospread the pain of the outages that in some cases lastedformore than a day.
AEP: Decision on where power was cut 'was driven by physics'
The utility also said no particular neighborhoods were targeted for shutdown, responding to claims the power outages targeted poorer neighborhoods.
"Simply put, the emergency load reduction was driven by physics," Marc Reitter, AEP Ohio's president and chief operating officer, told the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio on Wednesday.
State regulators called AEP andPJMInterconnection,the agency thatoversees the flow of electricity in all or parts of 13 states, including Ohio, before the PUCO to better understand the thinking behind the decisions that led AEP to shut off power on June 14 to neighborhoods throughout the city following the storm.
"It is something we do rarely," said Michael Bryson, PJM's senior vice president of operations. The last time PJM ordered shutoffs in Ohio was 2013.
But Bryson told commissioners that even though PJM issues the order to reduce demand for electricity, the utility determines where power should be shut off.
While AEP hadjust five minutes to act from thePJM order, Bryson said PJM and AEP were in constant communication during the duration of the storm and its fallout.
"The coordination went extremely well," he said.
Power outages: Storm, heat led to stress on transmission systems
Powerful storms called a derecho swept through much of Ohio on June 13 and 14, carryingwinds of 80 to 90 mph and three tornadoes. The storm was followed by temperatures topping 90 degreeson June 14 and 15.
AEP said the storms broke 458 poles in its distribution system and downed more than 107 miles of wires throughout its Ohio service area. Multiple transmission systems were damaged by the storm, including one extra-high-voltage tower.
Several transmission lines, which carry large loads of power from generating sources to the smaller distribution lines and substations, were knocked out by the storms, addingstress on remaining transmission lines.
AEP said the Columbus area has a robust transmission system that is built with redundancies, but the damage caused by the storm and demands from the subsequent heat were too much.
PJM and AEP said unless AEP shut off power to certain neighborhoods, the systems ultimately would have failed anyway and the result could have created a cascading effect that could have caused the outages to spread. That's whathappened in 2003 when a power outage in northeast Ohio led to the worst blackout in American history with 50 million people losing power.
AEP said the decision to shut off power came in waves.
The first wave between 1 and 2 p.m. June 14 affected 110,000 customers, primarily in neighborhoods in the North, Northeast and South sides.
A second wave between 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. affected an additional 40,000 customers in Grove City, Hilliard, Galloway and parts of the West Side.
A third wave on June 15 affected 125,000 customers scattered throughout the city and several suburbs, many of whom had lost power the day before.
On top of that, 21,257 customers in Franklin and Delaware counties and western Licking County — and about 150,000 statewide — lost power because of damage directly caused by the storm.
PUCO Chairperson Jenifer French said Wednesday's presentation was part of the PUCO's effort to understand what happened during the storm. She has instructed staff to prepare a report as it continues to gather information from AEP and PJM.
The Ohio Consumers' Counsel and other groups this week asked the PUCO to order an investigation of AEP.
"The PUCO should order an investigation of the AEP outages (as contrasted with its current 'review'), hire an independent auditor, order local hearings and other opportunities for the public to be heard, and determine if AEP was negligent and thereby owes consumers compensation for perishable food and other damages," the groups said in a motion filed this week with the agency.
Specifically, it said questions remained about the scope of the outages, whether storms caused the failure of AEP's transmission system and the demographics of the neighborhoods hurt the worst.
AEP Ohio President Reitter said no neighborhood was targeted for outages.
"Every central Ohio neighborhood was impacted,’’ he told reporters after the session.
He told regulators that AEP has identified areas where it can improve.
"We will do better," he said.
mawilliams@dispatch.com
@BizMarkWilliams
