Service territory FAQs

What is a service territory?

Electric certified territories (ECTs), often called “service areas” or “service territories,” are geographic regions where an electric company — which may be either an investor-owned utility or a rural electric cooperative — has the obligation and exclusive right to provide electric service. The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio is the authority regarding ECTs, and you can view the PUCO’s interactive map of ECTs at https://puco.ohio.gov/utilities/electricity/servicearea-map/electric-certified-territories-webmapping-application.

What’s the di erence between my co-op and an investor-owned utility?

Investor-owned utilities are business organizations that are intended to be profitable. An electric cooperative is a notfor-profit, member-owned utility that provides electric service solely to its members. Each cooperative has its own unique set of bylaws and is governed by a board of directors elected from and by the members of the coop. Nationally, more than 800 distribution cooperatives serve about 56% of the U.S. land area and more than 21.5 million homes, schools, businesses, and farms.

Why does the PUCO not regulate cooperatives?

The PUCO does not have jurisdiction over electric cooperatives and municipalities by the definitions of a “Public Utility” as defined in 4905.02 of the Ohio Revised Code, which states that an electric company that operates its utility not for profit, or that is owned and operated by any municipal corporation, is not included.

Ohio’s co-op service territories

North Western Electric Cooperative, Bryan

Tricounty Rural Electric Cooperative, Malinta

Paulding Putnam Electric Cooperative, Paulding

Hancock-Wood Electric Cooperative, North Baltimore

North Central Electric Cooperative, Attica

Firelands Electric Cooperative, New London

Lorain-Medina Rural Electric Cooperative, Wellington

Midwest Electric, Inc., St. Marys

Mid-Ohio Energy Cooperative, Kenton

Darke Rural Electric Cooperative, Greenville

Pioneer Electric Cooperative, Piqua

Logan County Electric Cooperative, Bellefontaine

URE–Union Rural Electric Cooperative, Marysville

Consolidated Cooperative, Mount Gilead

Holmes-Wayne Electric Cooperative, Millersburg

Carroll Electric Cooperative, Carrollton

Frontier Power Company, Coshocton

The Energy Cooperative, Newark

Guernsey-Muskingum Electric Cooperative, New Concord

South Central Power Company, Lancaster

Washington Electric Cooperative, Marietta

Butler Rural Electric Cooperative, Oxford

Adams Rural Electric Cooperative, West Union

Buckeye Rural Electric Cooperative, Rio Grande

Midwest Energy and Communications, Cassopolis, Michigan

Energy and Communications serves 1,000 members in northwestern Ohio.)

The co-ops determined the areas they’d serve when they formed, mostly based on geography and whether service was available from anyone else. Those territories remained mostly constant, though they were not legally defined. The situation led to some areas of overlapping service, which not only created confusion and safety issues, for example, for first responders arriving on an accident scene, but made it di cult for the utilities to plan for future growth.

Then in 1978, co-ops banded together to push the Ohio Legislature to pass House Bill 577, which defined service territories and mandated the Public Utilities Commission to certify the areas where each electric provider in the state has both the obligation and exclusive right to provide electric service. The legislation protected both co-ops and consumers, who could no longer be denied service for simple reason of convenience to the electricity provider. With the publication of the PUCO map, all co-ops, municipal systems, and investor-owned companies were granted specific, legally defined, and agreed-upon areas they serve. Co-ops serve about 400,000 homes and businesses in areas within 77 of Ohio’s 88 counties.

Service territories remained unchanged in the 1990s despite the deregulation that allowed competing energy providers to supply electricity to consumers through energy choice; co-ops and municipalities were specifically exempted. The PUCO’s regulatory authority does not extend to either government-run municipalities or member-run cooperatives.

And while that history is nice, members like the Bania family are just happy the place they live happens to be served by a co-op. “When our power was out for a couple of days during that winter storm a while back, we would watch our neighbor go out at all hours to get people reconnected,” Emily says. “He kept checking on us because he knew it might be a while and wanted to make sure we were OK. I can’t imagine you get that with the bigger companies.”

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