US utility American Electric Power (AEP) Ohio has tapped five data center firms to provide $18 million to help households in the state pay their electric bills.

The funds will be provided through AEP Ohio’s Neighbor to Neighbor program, which provides grants to cover electric bills for people experiencing financial hardship.

The data center companies include Meta, which committed $2m per year over five years, QTS, which committed $1m per year over three years, Amazon, which committed $2.5m, SoftBank Energy, which committed $1m, and Google, which committed $500,000 to the program and an additional $500,000 to support energy efficiency upgrades.

"These additional funds are a significant infusion for a program that helps Ohioans in need," said AEP Ohio president Marc Reitter. "This fund has always been about neighbors helping neighbors, and we are happy that our data center customers are a part of it."

The Dollar Energy Fund, a nonprofit organization, will manage the fund. The grants will be provided on a first-come, first-served basis.

The measures are part of a broader effort by the utility to prevent cost shifting caused by data center growth onto regular ratepayers. The utility approved a data center tariff in July 2025, which set a clear 25MW threshold for rate class applicability, with customers who fall into this designation required to cover a take-or-pay structure requiring payment for 85 percent of contracted capacity, regardless of actual consumption.

Following this, earlier this month, the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) directed the utility to enact new rules about how data centers connect to the grid.

The ruling will require data center companies to provide AEP Ohio with 180 days' notice before joining the grid. According to PUCO, the notice period will allow it to find enough energy to serve the data center through stand-alone auctions or quick purchases. The data center customer will be expected to cover all the costs associated with the new generation.

Also, last month, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine joined 22 other governors in signing President Trump’s voluntary Ratepayer Protection Pledge. The pledge, which now has more than 200 signatories, seeks to ensure that US ratepayers are not saddled with the costs of building out AI data centers.

Ohio is one of the larger data center markets in the US, with more than 180 active facilities, most clustered around Columbus.