Ohio regulator tied to group fighting renewables

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio utility regulator who opposed a planned American Electric Power Co. (NYSE:AEP) solar farm and used his Twitter page to question global warming has ties to a group behind model legislation that would repeal states’ renewable energy requirements.

Republican Todd Snitchler  chairs the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio helping implement Ohio’s renewable requirements.

He was a keynote speaker at the American Legislative Exchange Council’s April 2011 spring task force meeting. The event was held the month after Gov. John Kasich appointed the former lawmaker to the PUCO.

A PUCO spokeswoman said Snitchler discussed telecommunications, broadband, energy and environmental issues.

An Associated Press review of public documents finds Snitchler attended meetings of the exchange council regularly from 2009 through 2011, up to nearly a year after leaving the Legislature.