SHREVEPORT, Louisiana, Jan. 19, 2007 – AEP Texas North Company, Mutual Energy SWEPCO dba Mutual Energy SPP (ME SPP) and Southwestern Electric Power Company (SWEPCO), all units of American Electric Power, have received approval from the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) to transfer approximately 7,000 retail electric customers in the Texas Panhandle from AEP Texas to SWEPCO.  Currently, AEP Texas delivers electricity to the area and ME SPP provides retail customer service.

The PUCT approved the transfer during its Jan. 10 open meeting. The change will be effective Jan. 30, 2007. Regulatory approvals also have been received from the Louisiana Public Service Commission, Arkansas Public Service Commission and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

The affected customers are located in portions of Childress, Collingsworth, Donley, Hall and Wheeler counties.

The change is being made because the 7,000 AEP Texas customers and all of SWEPCO’s other 168,000 retail customers in East Texas are located in a regional electricity grid known as the Southwest Power Pool (SPP). The rest of the territory served by AEP Texas is located in a different electricity grid known as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT). While ERCOT offers retail choice, other areas of Texas outside of ERCOT, including SPP, have not initiated retail competition. It is more appropriate for a company already operating in the SPP to handle other SPP areas of Texas. SWEPCO will provide reliable, bundled electric service to these customers, just as it does to its existing customers.

The change will bring lower prices to the area, with estimated annual savings of approximately 15 to 20 percent depending on customer usage level and classification (residential, commercial, industrial and others).

“We welcome the North Texas Panhandle customers to the SWEPCO family,” said Venita McCellon-Allen, SWEPCO president and chief operating officer. “We look forward to providing excellent customer service and some of the lowest rates in the state,” she said.

Keith Honey, SWEPCO external affairs manager in Longview, Texas, said, “Customers will continue to be served by local service employees, the same Customer Solutions Center and billing operations, but under the name of SWEPCO.”

North Texas Panhandle customers will continue to call the same numbers they have used in the past – 1-800-723-7430 for Customer Service and 1-866-223-8508 to report an outage. While customers will receive a new account number under SWEPCO, they will not have to re-enroll in programs such as the Average Monthly Payment plan. Other details on the transfer will be outlined in a welcome packet being mailed to the customers and posted on the Web at www.SWEPCO.com under News & Issues.

SWEPCO is a sister company of AEP Texas and has been serving customers in Texas for more than 80 years with affordable electricity prices and reliable service. SWEPCO serves a total of 459,000 customers, including 175,000 in East Texas and the North Texas Panhandle, 173,000 in northwest Louisiana and 111,000 in western Arkansas. The company is headquartered in Shreveport, La.  For more information, visit www.SWEPCO.com.

SWEPCO is an operating unit of American Electric Power, an energy company based in Columbus, Ohio.  AEP is one of the largest electric utilities in the United States, delivering electricity to more than 5 million customers in 11 states.  AEP ranks among the nation’s largest generators of electricity, owning nearly 36,000 megawatts of generating capacity in the U.S.  AEP also owns the nation’s largest electricity transmission system, a nearly 39,000-mile network that includes more 765 kilovolt extra-high voltage transmission lines than all other U.S. transmission systems combined.