PUCO chair tells House Energy Committee Ohio must protect baseload generation and modernize the grid

Jennifer French, chair of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio and chair of the Ohio Power Siting Board, told the House Energy Committee that Ohio faces growing demand for electricity and must act to preserve baseload generation and modernize the grid.

French told the committee that the PUCO’s mission is to “assure all residential and business consumers have access to adequate, safe, and reliable utility services at fair prices while facilitating an environment that provides for competitive choices.” She emphasized that the commission regulates distribution, not generation or transmission, and said the state must be active at the regional and federal level to protect Ohio ratepayers.

The PUCO chair described three “buckets” of the electric system—generation, transmission and distribution—and said that while generation and transmission sit largely outside PUCO jurisdiction, Ohio has a direct interest in regional reliability because it sits inside the PJM regional transmission organization. French said Ohio has about 25,000 megawatts of installed generation and that roughly 60% of that capacity comes from natural gas. She noted the PJM footprint has about 180,000 megawatts of installed capacity and that new supply in recent years has been dominated by solar and battery storage.

“We need to keep what we have and get more,” French said, urging members to support policies that both preserve existing baseload plants and attract new, reliable, dispatchable generation to Ohio. She told lawmakers the PUCO has a federal energy advocate monitoring FERC and PJM activity and that the state has filed at the federal level on reliability and affordability issues.

Committee members asked about transmission expansion, competitive suppliers and consumer programs. Representative Isaacson asked how Ohio could double transmission capacity; French said some of the technical details are engineering issues but pointed to recent FERC guidance she described as “FERC 19 20” and said the PUCO is working with PJM to limit Ohio ratepayers from subsidizing other states’ policy choices. Representative Brennan asked about high capacity auction prices in PJM; French said the state and governor’s office have sought a separate interconnection queue for baseload generation at PJM to ensure developers of dispatchable resources can move forward.

On consumer protections, French described PUCO enforcement actions against competitive retail suppliers, the commission’s call center and an “Apples to Apples” comparison tool on the PUCO website to help customers compare offers. She said the PUCO can investigate suppliers, assess penalties and remove suppliers from the Ohio market when violations occur.

French closed by offering PUCO staff as a resource to the committee and by agreeing to provide additional data requested by members.

The committee’s questions and French’s answers stretched across the committee’s allotted time; members scheduled follow-up briefings and data requests to clarify transmission timelines and outage standards.