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PUCO chair mum when asked how agency will ensure FirstEnergy spends money to avoid power outages

Published By Cleveland.com on September 4, 2024
Sean P. Brennan In The News

COLUMBUS, Ohio — In light of August’s massive power outages, state Rep. Sean Brennan asked the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio how it plans to make sure that FirstEnergy spends customers money on avoiding power outages. Regulators had no response.

Brennan, a Parma Democrat, asked the PUCO members directly: “How will the PUCO hold FirstEnergy accountable for maintenance going forward?”

Jenifer French, chair of the PUCO, said FirstEnergy has a case pending before regulators. “Therefore, of course, we can’t make any comments on that.”

The exchange came during the PUCO’s Wednesday afternoon meeting, right after FirstEnergy officials had given commissioners a long and detailed presentation about the power outages that came from the Aug. 6 storms that included five tornadoes in Greater Cleveland.

 FirstEnergy told commissioners that restoring power cost an estimated $124.7 million. That includes spending $105 million paying both FirstEnergy’s workers and thousands of extra workers brought in through mutual aid.

Questions about fees
 
After the presentation, and after commissioners got a chance to ask FirstEnergy questions, state representatives were given the opportunity to ask FirstEnergy and commissioners questions.

Brennan said at the public meeting that residents were impressed by the linemen’s response after the power outage. But he said residents were also worried that fees they paid on their utility bills weren’t spent well.

 
Brennan was referring to an audit the PUCO released in January 2022. FirstEnergy had collected hundreds of millions of dollars from utility customers in a fee called a rider, which was supposed to be used to modernize its electric grid.

The state-commissioned audit found no evidence that the money led the Akron-based utility to spend more on grid modernization. The audit also found that FirstEnergy didn’t track how the money collected under its “distribution modernization rider” (or DMR) was spent, so auditors couldn’t tell whether any of it was spent on lobbying for the scandal-ridden House Bill 6 or increasing dividend payments to investors.

FirstEnergy spokeswoman Jennifer Young said in an email that the audit found no evidence that the revenue from the fee was spent on lobbying.

However in the audit, the PUCO said that “given the inability to trace how Rider DMR funds were spent, we cannot rule out with certainty use of Rider DMR funds to support of the passage of H.B. 6.”

Brennan said that despite Ohioans paying “significant dollars” toward the grid, the state seemed to have more power outages than its peers.

He also said that because how the fees were spent wasn’t tracked, some wondered if FirstEnergy spent it on lobbying “including the $60 million bribe we all know about.”

 
Brennan was referring to the House Bill 6 scandal, where FirstEnergy admitted to paying bribes to the former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and others to get help get the bill passed. It provided $1 billion to bail out two financially troubled nuclear power plants owned by a previous FirstEnergy subsidiary.

According to a report from Payless Power, a Texas-based energy company, in 2022, Ohio ranked third among all states with the most customers affected by power outages per capita.

French declined to comment, saying that FirstEnergy had a grid modernization case before the commission that was pending. FirstEnergy officials at the meeting also didn’t address Brennan’s question during the meeting, according to a livestreamed video of meeting.

PUCO spokesman Matt Schilling said after the meeting that the PUCO regularly monitors utilities’ compliance with reliability performance standards, monitors vegetation management programs, maintenance, inspection and repair procedures.

He said the audit is part of one of four PUCO investigations into House Bill 6, and another hearing on the rider is scheduled for February 2025.

Torrence Hinton, president of FirstEnergy’s Ohio operations, said during the meeting that the Aug. 6 storm was the worst power outage event the area has seen since a storm in July 1993.

After the presentation, Ohio Consumers’ Counsel Agency Director Maureen Willis released a statement, also saying that Ohio consumers provide utilities with millions of dollars to improve service reliability.

“Utilities must use these funds responsibly to minimize the frequency and duration of power outages for consumers,” Willis said in a statement. “It’s a consumer safety issue year-round, but even more so during extreme weather conditions.”

 
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