Energy

PJM customers are paying historic prices for a capacity market that still is not delivering meaningful new generation. A new Runnerstone analysis prepared for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association finds that PJM’s four most recent capacity auctions will cost customers more than $63 billion, with the latest auction alone totaling $16.4 billion. Yet less than 0.5% of the capacity clearing the 2028-29 auction came from new generation.

“Customers have paid more than $60 billion through these four auctions, and where is the new generation?” said Lindsey Short, OMA managing director of advocacy and energy. “If record-high prices aren’t bringing new supply into the market, PJM needs to explain why customers should keep paying them.”

The analysis also points to PJM’s compressed auction schedule, changing treatment of generation resources and rapidly growing large-load forecasts as factors contributing to high prices. Transmission owners added 1,374.5 megawatts of large-load adjustments to the latest forecast while only 524.7 megawatts of new, uprated and reactivated generation was added to the cleared auction.

Those concerns take on added urgency as PJM prepares a special Reliability Backstop Procurement aimed at addressing its projected capacity shortfall, potentially creating another source of costs that could ultimately reach Ohio customers. 8/18/2026

Data centers are driving some of the biggest electricity forecasts Ohio has ever seen. But how much of that projected demand is real, and how much should existing customers be expected to pay for before it materializes?

That debate will come to Columbus on Thursday, Aug. 27 at the 2026 Ohio Manufacturers’ Energy Conference, with a lineup that includes nationally recognized energy researcher Dr. Jonathan Koomey, U.S. Reps. Troy Balderson and Bob Latta, Ohio Consumers’ Counsel Maureen Willis and Abhijeet Sathe of SB Energy, part of SoftBank Group.

Koomey will challenge assumptions behind forecasts of explosive data center electricity demand, while Balderson and Latta will bring the federal perspective on energy policy, grid reliability and rising costs. Seryak and Willis will examine whether PJM is delivering the generation and reliability customers are paying for, and Sathe will take attendees inside the proposed PORTS Technology Campus near Piketon, a major AI and energy development that could ultimately reach 10 gigawatts.

“There is too much money at stake to simply assume every data center forecast will come true,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of advocacy and energy for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Before customers pay for new infrastructure, the demand needs to be real and the numbers need to hold up.”

The conference will bring together the people challenging the forecasts, writing the rules, building the projects and paying the bills at a moment when Ohio’s energy decisions are carrying billions of dollars in consequences. 8/21/2026

Abhijeet Sathe, co-CEO of SB Energy (SoftBank Group), will headline an afternoon keynote at the Ohio Manufacturers’ Energy Conference on Aug. 27 focused on one of Ohio’s most ambitious energy and infrastructure projects.

Sathe will discuss the PORTS Technology Campus, a planned AI data center campus paired with large-scale power generation. The project includes new natural gas generation and a $4.2 billion SB Energy investment through AEP Ohio for new high-voltage transmission infrastructure.

His keynote will examine how the project is being financed, planned and built, and what it could mean for Ohio’s power system as AI drives new electricity demand.

“Ohio is making decisions now that will shape electricity costs and reliability for years,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of advocacy and energy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA). “This is a rare opportunity to hear directly from the company behind one of the state’s largest energy and infrastructure projects about how it plans to meet that demand.”

Registration closes this Thursday, Aug. 20. Join OMA in Columbus for the Energy Conference and hear directly from Sathe and other industry leaders shaping Ohio’s energy future. 8/13/2026

Well, imagine that.

After years of breathless forecasts about explosive data center electricity demand, new Wood Mackenzie analysis finds that utilities and grid operators are likely to commit to just 28% of the 1,066 GW currently being requested for U.S. data center projects. More than two-thirds of that requested power may never materialize.

The finding is another reminder of the enormous gap between projects seeking power and projects actually likely to get built. Wood Mackenzie has previously documented hundreds of gigawatts of proposed data center capacity still searching for power, compared with a much smaller amount backed by signed construction or electricity supply agreements.

“Who could have possibly predicted that every data center asking for power might not actually show up?” said Lindsey Short, managing director of advocacy and energy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Customers should not be stuck paying billions of dollars to build the grid around the most optimistic number on somebody’s spreadsheet.”

The lesson is becoming harder to ignore. Before speculative demand drives major generation and transmission spending, policymakers and grid operators need to separate serious projects from wishful thinking. 8/13/2026

Ohio electric bills are reaching record highs, but AEP is already pointing policymakers toward its preferred solution. In explaining the increases, the utility emphasized that Ohio law prevents it from owning power plants and said it is left waiting for the competitive market to respond.

“AEP’s answer to record-high electric bills is to let AEP put more costs on electric bills,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of advocacy and energy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Re-regulation would guarantee the utility a return while forcing captive customers to absorb the risk. That is a great deal for AEP. It is a terrible deal for everyone paying the bill.”

Record-high bills should bring greater scrutiny of utility proposals, not become the sales pitch for putting customers back on the hook for utility-owned generation. 8/3/2026

Dr. Jonathan Koomey will open the Ohio Manufacturers’ Energy Conference on Aug. 27 with a closer look at the assumptions driving forecasts of explosive data center electricity demand.

Koomey is best known for Koomey’s Law, which found that the energy efficiency of computing historically doubled about every 18 months. That matters because forecasts built on today’s technology can badly overstate tomorrow’s electricity needs.

His keynote will examine how efficiency, technological change and uncertain demand should be reflected in data center load forecasts before speculative projections drive billions of dollars in grid spending and land on customer bills.

“Koomey’s research is a powerful reminder that tomorrow’s energy demand cannot be projected using today’s technology,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of advocacy and energy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Before speculative forecasts trigger billions in grid spending, regulators need to test the assumptions, account for efficiency gains and make sure customers are not paying for demand that may never materialize.”

Only two weeks remain to register for the Aug. 27 conference. 8/7/2026

Exelon’s “high probability” data center load pipeline across its utilities in Illinois and the Mid-Atlantic fell nearly 40%, from 18 GW to 11 GW, after the company began requiring developers to make firmer financial commitments through transmission service agreements.

The drop did not occur in Ohio, but the lesson is directly relevant here. Seven gigawatts of supposedly likely demand disappeared once developers had to demonstrate that their projects were real.

“Exelon did what every utility and grid operator should be doing before speculative demand is used to justify billions of dollars in new spending,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of advocacy and energy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Require meaningful commitments, weed out the projects that exist only on paper and make sure customers are paying for actual need, not somebody’s wish list.”

Ohio policymakers and reporters should take note. Huge load projections deserve scrutiny, not automatic acceptance. 8/3/2026

AEP Ohio has cut disputed customer load forecasts by as much as 33% after the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA) Energy Group challenged assumptions that did not hold up under scrutiny.

The original forecasts projected major electricity-use growth across several commercial and industrial customer classes, including some where expected data center growth was unlikely to materialize. OMA warned that those inflated projections could distort rates and shift costs among customers. PUCO staff agreed that several forecasts were significantly overstated and ordered AEP to update them.

The result is a far more realistic proposal. General service secondary and primary customers would now see increases of less than 1%, while transmission-level customers would see a 1.6% decrease.

“AEP’s original numbers did not survive contact with the evidence,” said Ryan Augsburger, president of the OMA. “We challenged the assumptions, PUCO forced a correction and customers are now looking at rates based on numbers that are actually credible. This is exactly why forecasts must be tested before they become customer bills.”

The correction is a win for customers, but it also proves the larger point. Unproven forecasts should be challenged in open PUCO proceedings, not baked into law before customers can test the assumptions and cost shifts behind them. 7/29/2026

Bad energy reporting does not just mislead readers. It can help turn speculative forecasts into billions of dollars in customer costs.

In a new RealClearEnergy column, Dave O’Neil, director of communications for The Ohio Manufacturers’ Association, argues that too much coverage of electricity markets repeats crisis claims without seriously testing the assumptions behind them. Forecasts are reported as established demand. Proposed data centers are treated as operating facilities. Administrative market decisions are presented as proof of a physical power shortage.

The column points to proposed transmission projects in AES Ohio’s territory that could leave other customers exposed to more than $1.3 billion in costs, as well as a PJM capacity auction that directed roughly $16 billion to power suppliers while delivering little new generation.

“Too much energy coverage starts with the conclusion and works backward,” O’Neil said. “Reporters repeat the crisis claim, skip the hard questions and move straight to explaining why customers must pay. That is not scrutiny. It is stenography for the institutions asking Ohioans to absorb billions of dollars in new costs.”

Journalists are supposed to test claims, challenge assumptions and follow the money. When they simply repeat utility and grid-operator claims, speculative forecasts begin to look like settled facts and enormous customer costs begin to look inevitable. 7/27/2026

Data center electricity “forecasts” continue to surge, raising questions about how much projected demand will actually materialize and how much customers should be expected to finance.

BloombergNEF recently increased its estimate for U.S. data center electricity demand in 2035 to 194 gigawatts, an 83% jump from its forecast just six months earlier. Forecasts from different firms now vary by roughly 100 gigawatts, an amount approximately equal to the entire existing U.S. nuclear power fleet.

That enormous range underscores the uncertainty surrounding projects that utilities and grid operators are already using to justify billions of dollars in new generation and transmission spending. Analysts also acknowledged that much of the proposed data center capacity remains in the early stages of development and that some developers have no experience building data centers.

“A forecast that changes by 83% in six months, while differing from other estimates by the equivalent of the nation’s entire nuclear fleet, should not become a decades-long obligation for customers,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of energy and advocacy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA). “Before manufacturers are asked to pay for new infrastructure, regulators should verify that the projected demand is real, committed and likely to materialize.”

OMA continues to support independent review of large-load forecasts before speculative demand is built into customer rates. 7/28/2026

The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) has finalized new rules allowing electric utilities to seek rate increases based on projected spending rather than costs they have already incurred.

The Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA) Energy Group proposed a one-way true-up requiring utilities to refund customers when forecasts prove too high, while preventing them from collecting more when they underestimate. The Ohio Consumers’ Counsel separately proposed refunds with interest for overcharges. The commission rejected both proposals.

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before, but utilities fared better. The PUCO declined to require automatic sharing of all supporting documents at the start of a case and gave utilities more time to calculate and return overcollections.

“So utilities can overestimate and keep customers’ money, or underestimate and come back for more?” said Lindsey Short, OMA managing director of energy and advocacy services. “The commission rejected safeguards against either outcome. Utilities make the predictions. Customers should not have to pay for every miss.” 7/27/2026

NBC4 in Columbus interviewed Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA) President Ryan Augsburger this week about PJM’s latest capacity auction, rising customer costs and the need for greater scrutiny of utility load forecasts.

Augsburger told the station that customers are “getting a raw deal” from a market producing record costs without delivering meaningful new generation. He also highlighted OMA’s support for the bipartisan Electricity Forecast Integrity Act, which would require independent review of utility forecasts before projected demand is used to justify higher customer costs.

The story’s headline, however, declared that data centers have caused Ohio’s energy demand to surpass supply. The reporting beneath it did not establish that claim. In fact, the story quoted PJM acknowledging that falling short of its reliability target does not necessarily mean the system cannot serve customers reliably.

That contradiction reflects a broader problem in energy coverage. Forecasts are often presented as established demand. Proposed data centers are treated as operating facilities. PJM auction results are described as evidence of a physical power shortage without adequate attention to reserve requirements, plant deratings, market rules or delays in connecting new generation.

“This is not just imprecise reporting,” said Dave O’Neil, OMA communications director. “It is reporting that can shape public policy, weaken customer protections and make enormous spending proposals appear inevitable. Ohioans deserve skepticism, context and basic factual discipline. Too often, they are getting none of the three.”

The stakes are significant. Utilities, grid operators and policymakers are asking customers to absorb billions of dollars in new costs based heavily on projections about future demand. When those projections are reported as present-day facts, the public is led to believe that expensive policy responses are unavoidable and that the only remaining question is who will pay.

OMA believes the assumptions behind those proposals deserve far more scrutiny. Reporters should examine whether projected projects are likely to be built, how PJM calculates its reserve needs, why record capacity prices have produced so little new generation and what customers are receiving in return.

Augsburger’s message was straightforward. Customers are paying more, the market is delivering too little and the forecasts driving those costs should not be accepted without independent review. 7/21/2026

New Ohio Attorney General Andy Wilson told Cleveland.com that state prosecutors are preparing a clearer and stronger case against former FirstEnergy executives Chuck Jones and Mike Dowling, whose first public-corruption trial ended in a mistrial this spring.

The two men now face an expanded 22-count indictment tied to allegations surrounding the House Bill 6 scandal and a $4.3 million payment to former Public Utilities Commission of Ohio Chair Sam Randazzo. Both defendants have denied wrongdoing.

Wilson said he is “very comfortable” with the prosecution team’s strategy and expects the retrial to begin this fall.

“We are still paying the price for a system that rewarded utility influence and failed to protect customers,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of energy and advocacy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Accountability cannot end with House Bill 6. It must include fixing the regulatory rules and incentives that allowed customers to be put last.” 7/20/2026

New reporting from The Toledo Blade and The Statehouse News Bureau reinforced the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association’s (OMA) warning that PJM’s capacity market is imposing higher costs without producing meaningful new electricity supply.

PJM’s latest auction reached the federally approved price cap, yet the grid operator still fell short of its reliability target. The auction added only 525 megawatts of net new generation, the lowest total in a decade.

OMA President Ryan Augsburger told The Blade that the result reflects more than a simple supply shortage.

“This is a question of what PJM chooses to count, how high it sets the target, what it prevents from competing and how those decisions are used to justify billions of dollars in additional customer costs,” Augsburger said.

Both stories also examined Senate Bill 457, the bipartisan Electricity Forecast Integrity Act. The legislation would require independent verification and greater transparency before utility demand forecasts are used to drive capacity purchases and transmission spending.

“We need future utility load forecasts to have better transparency and better accountability,” Augsburger said.

The coverage underscores a basic problem. Customers are being required to pay maximum prices, but the market is still failing to deliver the new generation those prices are supposed to attract. 7/20/2026

The Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA) took its energy affordability message to audiences across Ohio yesterday as President Ryan Augsburger spoke with Sarah Donaldson of The Statehouse News Bureau and Danny Eldredge of The Toledo Blade.

The interviews focused on PJM’s latest capacity auction, which again reached the price cap while producing little meaningful new generation.

“When customers are paying more, they should be getting something for it,” Augsburger said. “We should be getting more supply, and we are not. That tells us the auction is not working.”

Augsburger urged reporters and policymakers to “follow the money,” noting that generators and transmission utilities benefit when speculative forecasts create the appearance of scarcity.

“Utilities are winning. Generators are winning. Customers are losing,” he said. “Customers are having their pockets picked.”

Augsburger also explained that PJM counts uncertain future demand as though it is guaranteed, delays new generation from entering the market and then points to the resulting gap as evidence that customers must pay more.

“That is not a functioning competitive market,” Augsburger said. “That is a rigged market.”

He also pushed back on efforts to blame data centers for every increase in electricity costs, arguing that utilities are using them as a convenient scapegoat while resisting proposals that would allow large customers to pay infrastructure costs up front.

The interviews followed an OMA release detailing how PJM’s latest auction manufactured scarcity on paper while sending customers another multibillion-dollar bill.

The OMA continues to demand greater scrutiny, transparency and accountability before customers are charged billions of dollars for a shortage created largely on paper. 7/17/2026

Electricity costs are climbing, PJM’s markets are producing record-high prices, and utilities are seeking billions of dollars for new infrastructure. The Ohio Manufacturers’ Energy Conference is where the people paying those bills get the facts, challenge the assumptions and hear directly from the experts shaping what comes next.

“Too many energy decisions are being made with customers expected to pay first and ask questions later,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of energy and advocacy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA). “This conference is where we examine the numbers, challenge the assumptions and focus on what actually lowers costs.”

Join the OMA on Aug. 27 for Ohio’s most comprehensive energy forum, with market intelligence, cost-control strategies, policy updates and practical solutions. Register by July 30 to secure early-bird pricing. 7/16/2026

Ohioans looking to lower their electric bills are told to find the right page of their bill, locate the “price to compare,” search a state website, compare fixed and variable rates, watch for fees and promotional traps, and remember to repeat the process later.

Do everything correctly and the estimated savings might be about $12 a month.

“Ohioans should not need a minor in electricity procurement just to keep their utility bills under control,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of energy and advocacy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “If the best customer protection we can offer is a scavenger hunt through rate plans and fine print to maybe save $12, the system has lost the plot.”

Shopping can help at the margins. But this is an absurd amount of homework to place on customers while the largest forces driving electric bills remain beyond their control.

Ohioans need transparency, accountability and real customer protection, not more homework. 7/14/2026

A recent heat wave produced a brief $28,000-per-megawatt price in PJM’s frequency-regulation market, a specialized service used to balance the grid second by second.

The number is dramatic. Its significance is less clear.

Frequency regulation represents only a small share of total electricity costs, and PJM’s independent market monitor has questioned whether recent rule changes are inflating those payments. The spike may reveal more about flawed market design than an actual shortage of electricity.

Meanwhile, new generation remains trapped in PJM’s interconnection backlog, speculative demand forecasts continue to drive higher costs, and customers are being asked to pay more while receiving less transparency.

“PJM should not be allowed to point to every unusual price as proof of a power crisis, especially when its own market rules may be contributing to the result,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of energy and advocacy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “Before customers are asked to pay billions more, PJM must prove the problem is real and prove it is not making the problem worse.” 7/13/2026

PJM spent months warning of a looming reliability crisis. Then extreme heat arrived, electricity demand climbed near record levels and the grid performed.

An analysis by the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (OMA) found PJM maintained roughly 6,500 megawatts of operating reserves above required levels during the hottest hours of July 2. Even at the tightest point of the day, reserves remained 55% above the requirement.

That raises an uncomfortable question. Why are customers paying scarcity prices while viable generation remains trapped in PJM’s interconnection backlog and speculative demand forecasts are treated as guaranteed load?

“PJM cannot restrict supply, inflate demand with speculative forecasts and then charge customers for the scarcity it helped create,” said OMA Managing Director of Energy and Advocacy Services Lindsey Short.

OMA is calling on federal regulators and Congress to investigate whether PJM’s market rules, forecasting practices and administrative failures are driving unjustified costs for manufacturers, families and other customers.

The grid passed the test. PJM’s crisis narrative did not. 7/8/2026

A new Reuters report puts a national spotlight on what rising electricity costs are already doing to Ohio manufacturers.

OMA members Belden Brick, Plaskolite and Tosoh SMD describe soaring costs, difficult operating decisions and growing threats to their competitiveness. Belden Brick’s monthly capacity charge alone jumped from $1,600 to $12,000.

The story focuses heavily on data-center growth. But the more fundamental problem is not new customers seeking power. It is a market that allows aggressive, unverified load forecasts to drive up costs for manufacturers before that demand ever materializes.

“Ohio manufacturers are paying real bills today based on electricity demand that may never show up,” said Lindsey Short, managing director of energy and advocacy services for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association. “That is not planning. It is speculation with someone else’s money. Policymakers should require independent proof before another dollar is shifted onto the factory floor.”

Reuters is right to show the consequences. Now policymakers must confront the cause. 7/7/2026