SHREVEPORT, La., September 27, 2007  – American Electric Power’s (AEP) Southwestern Electric Power Company (SWEPCO), working with The Conservation Fund, has assisted in the acquisition of 92 acres of land that has been donated to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to expand the Red River National Wildlife Refuge south of Bossier City. Additionally, SWEPCO assisted in funding 196 acres of property that will be reforested in the Upper Ouachita National Wildlife Refuge in Northeast Louisiana. AEP’s total investment in the project will be $450,000 once all properties are acquired.

The Red River National Wildlife Refuge and the Upper Ouachita National Wildlife Refuge are part of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service´s integrated migratory bird management plan. This plan includes restoring thousands of acres of forested wetland habitat in the Lower Mississippi River Ecosystem, and provides multiple biodiversity values, such as improved water quality, habitat restoration, and ecosystem restoration. 

Reforesting agricultural areas and maintaining these lands in forest vegetation also is a way to sequester carbon, a greenhouse gas, naturally (take carbon out of the air and hold it in living plant tissue).  Greenhouse gases trap energy from the sun and keep the heat from escaping back into space, which contribute to global warming.

“As an industry leader in climate action, AEP supports projects such as this to offset carbon dioxide emissions from its coal-fueled fleet of power plants,” said Brian Bond, SWEPCO VP-external affairs in Shreveport. SWEPCO proposes to construct the Turk Power Plant, a new coal-fired plant at Fulton, Ark. using state-of-the-art ultra supercritical technology. “The plant will burn less coal and generate fewer emissions than today’s existing coal units,” adds Bond. “The new technology will facilitate the use of coal to generate electricity in a carbon-constrained world.”

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SWEPCO serves over 464,000 customers in three states: 112,000 in western Arkansas, 176,000 in Northwest Louisiana, and 176,000 in East and North Texas. News releases and other information about SWEPCO can be found at www.swepco.com.

American Electric Power is one of the largest electric utilities in the United States, delivering electricity to more than 5 million customers in 11 states.  AEP ranks among the nation’s largest generators of electricity, owning nearly 38,000 megawatts of generating capacity in the U.S.  AEP also owns the nation’s largest electricity transmission system, a nearly 39,000-mile network that includes more 765 kilovolt extra-high voltage transmission lines than all other U.S. transmission systems combined.  AEP’s transmission system directly or indirectly serves about 10 percent of the electricity demand in the Eastern Interconnection, the interconnected transmission system that covers 38 eastern states and central U.S. states and eastern Canada, and approximately 11 percent of the electricity demand in ERCOT, the transmission system that covers much of Texas. AEP’s utility units operate as AEP Ohio, AEP Texas, Appalachian Power (in Virginia and West Virginia), AEP Appalachian Power (in Tennessee), Indiana Michigan Power, Kentucky Power, Public Service Company of Oklahoma, and Southwestern Electric Power Company (in Arkansas, Louisiana and east and north Texas).  AEP’s headquarters are in Columbus, Ohio.