The good, the bad, and the ugly on Ohio's long overdue energy legislation

Yahoo

19-03-2025

An electricity meter. (Stock photo from Getty Images.)
This year, new legislation in the Ohio Statehouse could finally see the end to some of the worst aspects of 2019's House Bill 6 — which David Roberts of Vox called 'the worst energy bill of the 21st century.'
That is great news — but it would come at a high cost. Instead of bailing out coal and nuclear plants, Ohioans could find themselves living next to large gas plants, pushed through a fast-track approval process without local approval, supplied with gas from fracking our parks.
Read on to learn the good, the bad, and the ugly about Ohio Senate Bill 2 and Ohio House Bill 15.
Among the good things SB 2 and HB 15 would do is phase out the bailouts of two Ohio Valley Electric Coalition (OVEC) coal plants jointly owned by several Ohio utilities – one of which is in Indiana. Ohioans have paid upward of $670 million in coal bailouts since HB 6.
The coal bailouts would end at the expiration of each utility's 'electric security plan' — plans that allow utilities to attach extra charges, or 'riders,' to customer bills — over the next five years. Then the electric security plans themselves would also be eliminated.
Instead, utilities would have to work with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) to set a standard service offer – the going rate for electricity – based only on markets, without extra riders or fees. Utilities would have to work with PUCO annually to ensure the rate is in line with changing market conditions.
Some other good things in the current version of these two bills include:
A community energy pilot program in HB 15 that would allow small scale energy projects – 10 MW or 20 MW – to be built on distressed land that people could subscribe to for their electricity use.
An energy efficiency loan program for schools in SB 2 – a good program that should also include loans for solar panels, which it originally had.
If that's where SB 2 and HB 15 stopped, there would be plenty to support. However, both bills also contain some terrible provisions that should be changed or removed for the sake of Ohio's communities and our environment.
These provisions revolve around an accelerated review process at the Ohio Power Siting Board (OPSB), which approves the siting of major energy facilities such as large electric generation plants, transmission lines, and pipelines.
The current OPSB process takes months and sometimes years. It involves public information sessions, applications that run thousands of pages, public hearings, months of written public comments, an agency investigation, and an adjudicatory hearing to establish the facts.
SB 2 would shorten this process to just 120 days – four months. Even worse, both bills would shorten the process to only 45 days – just six weeks – for two types of applications:
An electric generation plant, electric transmission line, or gas pipeline in a Priority Investment Area
A major utility facility – defined as 50 MW or more – on property owned by the applicant.
In the first case, local governments would nominate brownfields or former coal mines in their communities to be Priority Investment Areas — so at least there would be local buy-in.
In the second case, there is no local involvement. The only party that identifies the location for a 50 MW or larger energy generation plant is the 'applicant' who owns the property. Nothing in either bill specifies who the applicant could be — but presumably a large energy user such as a data center.
Data centers are what is driving this. These large buildings house rows and rows of computer servers that must be kept running and kept cool. Each data center uses hundreds of megawatts of electricity — equal to a small city — to power things like cloud computing, AI, or cryptocurrency.
There are 176 data centers in Ohio. Of those, 108 are in Central Ohio — and of those, many are in residential areas. I should know — there's an Amazon data center campus across the street from my house, and three others within five miles — all surrounded by homes and businesses.
SB 2 and HB 15 would allow the owners of these data centers to get approval in 45 days to build a large electricity generation plant on property they own with no local approval.
How would the electricity be generated? Through fracked gas plants, Senate President Rob McColley and House Speaker Matt Huffman recently told the Ohio Oil and Gas Association.
In Ohio, the setback requirement for wind turbines is 1/4 mile from the nearest property line — too much for data center land in an urban or suburban area. A solar project big enough to create enough electricity would also be too large. The main alternative is gas.
Senate Bill 52 from 2021 allows local governments to ban solar and wind projects, but not oil and gas — and at least 24 Ohio counties have done so.
Already applications for three gas plants to power data centers 'behind the meter' have been filed with the power siting board, with more being prepared.
'We think there will be new gas powered generation all over the state of Ohio,' Huffman told the oil and gas association.
If SB 2 and HB 15 pass as currently written, some of those gas plants will end up in residential areas.
Where will the gas to supply these plants come from? From fracking our state parks, wildlife areas, and public lands, Huffman told the oil and gas association. And they want the frack pads to be located not just outside the parks as they are now, but actually IN our state parks and public lands.
'I want to be aggressive about that in the House of Representatives,' Huffman said.
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SB 2 and HB 15 would go a long way to cleaning up the travesty of HB 6 — but at what cost? The accelerated review process for approving major energy facilities — such as a 100 MW gas plant — must be lengthened. Nine months is not too long to review such a complicated project.
If Republicans absolutely refuse to lengthen the review process, then local officials must be given veto power over gas plants in their counties and townships — just as they have for solar and wind projects.
Finally, fracking in, around, and under our beloved state parks, wildlife areas, and public lands must stop. The vast majority of Ohioans are opposed. The last four nominations to frack our parks and wildlife areas received 923 comments. Only one comment out of 923 was in favor. That's 1/10th of one percent – 99.9% of comments were opposed.
We can't build fracked gas plants to power AI and crypto on the backs of our communities and our public lands that are supposed to be protected. Ohio must work toward a sane energy policy that welcomes clean renewable energy that sustains rather than destroys people and planet.
Cathy Cowan Becker is board president for Save Ohio Parks. She lives in Hilliard, Ohio.
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