Our Energy Frontier | EDG, Inc.

Reprinted with permission from the Ohio Society of Professional Engineers

Ohio’s energy frontier is no longer hypothetical

by Toby Zeringue, Curtis Sharp and Erin Eberts, Consulting Engineers, EDG, Inc

For much of the last decade, conversations about the future of energy sounded safely abstract. Engineers talked about electrification curves, increased load demand, a shift to renewables, transmission constraints, and emerging technologies as if they were events scheduled for some distant planning horizon.

That distance is gone.

Across Ohio, the energy frontier is no longer theoretical. It is arriving as signed load agreements, built substations, factory construction, and transmission projects are already on the ground. The challenge now is not imagining what the future grid might look like but engineering it fast enough to maintain a reliable grid.

When demand stops being incremental

Ohio has long been a manufacturing state, accustomed to large industrial loads. What is different today is the scale and speed of new demand.

Data centers, semiconductor manufacturing, and advanced materials facilities are appearing not as isolated projects, but as clusters. Individually, many of these sites rival the load of small cities. Collectively, they are reshaping regional planning assumptions.

Grid operators have publicly acknowledged that electricity demand is growing faster than at any time in recent memory, with large computing facilities responsible for much of that growth. While at the same time, there has been a reduction in the use of fossil fuels. Unlike traditional industrial loads, these facilities operate continuously, with little tolerance for interruption and limited flexibility to shift demand.

For engineers, this changes the math.

• Peak demand is no longer a seasonal problem.
• Reserve margins are stressed by round-the-clock load.
• Transmission constraints appear earlier in the planning cycle.

In central Ohio, these dynamics are already visible. Utilities have built high-capacity substations years ahead of expected load, only to find that project timelines and customer needs shift faster than traditional infrastructure can adapt.

A substation with nowhere to go

One of the clearest illustrations is in Licking County.

A 500-megawatt substation was constructed to serve a major semiconductor manufacturing campus, designed to deliver power comparable to that used by hundreds of thousands of homes. The infrastructure was completed early, technically ready, and physically connected.

Then the manufacturing schedule slipped. Instead of sitting idle, the substation became a case study in modern grid improvisation. Utility engineers and regulators worked through how unused capacity could temporarily serve nearby data centers without compromising future commitments. The result was a short-term reconfiguration that kept assets productive while preserving long
term reliability.

This kind of flexibility would have been unusual a decade ago; however, today, it is becoming a design requirement.

Reliability now means days, not hours

As demand grows, so does the need for reliability beyond traditional definitions.

Historically, grid storage was built to manage short disturbances. Four hours of battery capacity could smooth solar ramps or provide contingency support. That model works when variability happens within a single day.

It breaks down during multi-day events.

Extended winter storms, prolonged heat waves, and regional fuel constraints expose the limits of short-duration resources. Engineers are now planning for scenarios where renewable generation remains constrained for days, not hours, while load remains constant.

This has accelerated interest in long-duration energy storage, particularly technologies capable of discharging for 24 to 100 hours.

One of the most closely watched examples sits just outside Ohio’s border, where iron-air batteries are entering commercial production. Unlike lithium-ion systems, these batteries trade power density for endurance, using abundant materials to deliver energy over multiple days.

For Ohio planners, the significance is practical:

• Multi-day storage can replace peaking resources during extended stress events.
• It can defer or reduce transmission upgrades by shifting energy across time.
• It aligns well with steady industrial and data center loads.

Long-duration storage does not replace short-duration batteries. It complements them. Together, they begin to form a reliability stack that matches real-world operating conditions.

Old geology, new purpose

Ohio’s energy future is not being built solely above ground.

The state already has extensive experience with underground energy infrastructure, particularly natural gas storage in depleted reservoirs. That expertise is now prompting discussions about subsurface energy storage, including the possibility of using abandoned coal mines or engineered caverns for fuel storage. Underground energy storage is particularly beneficial when natural gas is needed for home heating and ensures that power will be available under the worst conditions.

Researchers and national laboratories are actively studying how legacy mining infrastructure could be repurposed, examining structural stability, water chemistry, and long-term performance. While still experimental, the concept reflects a broader theme: the
next frontier often builds on previous successes.

For engineers familiar with the region’s geology, hydrology, and environmental constraints, this work feels less exotic than it might elsewhere. Ground-breaking work in the area of carbon capture and sequestration has already been successfully conducted.

A quiet nuclear milestone in southern Ohio

Another frontier is unfolding far from the data center corridors, in Pike County.

There, engineers have restarted a capability the US largely lost decades ago: domestic uranium enrichment for advanced nuclear fuels. The facility has successfully produced high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU), which is required by many next generation reactor designs.

This matters because advanced reactors are no longer hypothetical. Several designs are moving through licensing and demonstration phases, with specific interest from industries that need clean, continuous power.

For Ohio, the implications are unusual but important:

• A domestic fuel supply reduces geopolitical risk.
• Advanced reactors could pair naturally with large, constant loads.
• Nuclear engineering and manufacturing expertise returns to the region.

This is not a promise for new plants tomorrow. It is the reassembly of a supply chain that makes future options real.

Hydrogen, cautiously advancing

The Appalachian region has been selected as a hub for clean hydrogen development, with planning underway across Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Proposed projects span production, storage, transportation, and end uses ranging from transit to industrial feedstocks.

The engineering questions are significant:

• How to manage hydrogen embrittlement in existing infrastructure.
• How to transport and safely store large volumes underground.
• How to integrate hydrogen production with an already stressed grid.

Progress has been uneven, and uncertainty remains, particularly around economics and policy. Still, pilot projects continue. For sectors that cannot easily electrify, hydrogen remains one of the few viable options.

Transmission becomes the bottleneck

If there is a single constraint uniting all of these frontiers, it is transmission.

New generation, new storage, and new load all depend on a grid that can move power where it is needed. In Ohio, utilities are investing heavily in high-voltage lines, smart grid technologies, and advanced monitoring systems.

Smart meters and automated distribution equipment may not grab headlines, but they provide something increasingly valuable: reliability. Knowing where power flows, where congestion forms, and where out ages begin allows engineers to operate closer to system limits without crossing them.

Transmission planning has also become more proactive. Instead of reacting to individual projects, planners are modeling regional load growth and building capacity in advance, even when that means infrastructure sits underutilized for a time.

What this means for engineers

Ohio’s energy frontier is not defined by a single technology but rather by integration.

Engineers working in the state over the next decade will need to think across disciplines:

• Electrical engineers coordinating with geotechnical specialists.
• Power planners working alongside industrial designers.
• Reliability engineers modeling events that last days, not minutes.

Several practical lessons are already emerging:

• Design flexibility into infrastructure from the start.
• Assume load will arrive faster than expected.
• Plan for multi-day reliability, not just peak hours.
• Treat legacy infrastructure as an asset, not a constraint.
• Federal funding influences clean energy programs.
• Fossil fuels may have resurgence for enhanced reliability.
• Consider support needs for community engagement of new projects.

The frontier is already here

Ohio’s energy frontier is here today. It is local, immediate, and already under construction.

Substations are built ahead of schedule. Factories wait for power. Storage technologies move from pilot to production. Fuel supply chains reappear where they once vanished.

The challenge for Ohio’s engineering community is not to predict what comes next, but to deliver systems that work while everything else is still changing.

That is no longer a future problem.

It is today’s work.

Toby Zeringue, Curtis Sharp and Erin Eberts are consulting engineers at EDG, Inc. Toby Zeringue is a business development and market analysis leader. Curtis Sharp, PE, is a process engineer experienced in new power generation technology assessments. Erin Eberts, PE, represents EDG’s Westerville office and is experienced in system integration and evolving technology strategies. EDG operates globally with a wide range of engineering and project support, including electrical generation and grid assessment.

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