COLUMBUS, Ohio, Feb. 7, 2001 - The first net metering customer of Columbus Southern Power Company (CSP) was made official recently when Robert Howard signed a contract formalizing the arrangement under Ohio’s new electric choice law. CSP, an operating company of American Electric Power (NYSE: AEP), serves more than 685,000 customers in central and southern Ohio.

Howard is the president of Howard Industries, Inc., a custom chemical processing company based in Columbus.

Participants at the signing, left to right: Rob Howard; Greg Kuss, Green Energy Ohio (GEO); Larry Hutchison, AEP; Robert Martin, GEO.

Net metering is available to electric customers of Ohio’s investor-owned utilities, which includes CSP. Customers who generate electricity on their property using solar, wind, biomass, landfill gas, hydropower, microturbine with a generating capacity up to 100 kw, or fuel cell can be credited for the electricity they flow to the power grid.

"This is an exciting time," said Howard. "I pursued this to show that alternative energy sources are viable for producing electricity, even in Columbus, Ohio. I hope this is just the first step, and others will follow in the path that AEP and I have laid out."

"Rob is a true trailblazer for others in Ohio wishing to become net metering customers," said Floyd Nickerson, AEP Ohio President. "His enthusiasm is matched only by his knowledge, and the success of his system speaks for itself."

Howard installed an 18-kilowatt wind turbine on his 5-acre property northeast of Columbus in 1995. Originally installed to supply power to a shrimp farm, which has since been sold, the turbine now provides power to Howard’s home and office complex. When excess power is produced, it is supplied to the CSP grid and Howard is credited for the energy.

Howard and AEP engineers have worked together to ensure the proper interconnection and shut-off mechanisms are in place to protect the reliability and safety of CSP’s distribution system. With Ohio’s law that restructured the electric industry, utilities are required to allow net metering capacity up to 1 percent of the utility’s aggregate retail customer peak demand.

Howard’s wind turbine is connected to a system that converts the "wild" alternating current (AC) electricity generated to direct current (DC) through a rectifier. The DC is then converted back to AC for use. "We installed this system in lieu of a dedicated transformer," Howard said.

A computer circuit board tracks eight monitoring points: current wind speed, peak wind gust, average wind speed, wind power density, elapsed time, hour of peak gust, hours of cut-in and hours of energy lull. Howard uses the information for research.

For safety, the turbine shuts down when wind speed exceeds 52 mph.

Howard has invested $24,000 in the system. "I consider this to be an investment in learning, so that others can refine and build on my results," Howard said.

Howard has also installed a photo voltaic system (solar panels) on an outbuilding on the same property. This system, engineered to follow the sun’s path for optimum efficiency, has a capacity of 1 kw.

Nickerson says that CSP customers interested in becoming net metering customers will need to comply with company requirements for interconnection to the system. Costs associated with compliance do not include the cost of the generation system itself.

More information about wind and solar power technologies is available in the environmental section of AEP’s Web site.