Nick Akins, President and CEO of American Electric Power

Nick Akins is president and chief executive officer of American Electric Power. He is AEP’s 10th president and sixth CEO in the company’s more than 100-year history. He is a member of AEP’s board of directors and is the only management representative on the board.

Akins rose through the ranks at both AEP and the former Central and South West Corp. (CSW), which merged with AEP in 2000. Akins began his nearly 30-year tenure in 1982 as an electrical engineer before moving up to positions of increasing responsibility. Prior to being elected president of AEP in December 2010, he served as executive vice president - Generation from 2006 through 2010 with responsibility for all generation activities of AEP’s approximately 38,000 MW of generation resources. This included engineering, construction, power plant operations, fuels procurement, logistics, new generation and marketing and trading.

While leading the generation business unit, Akins oversaw technological advances to address climate change and a growing demand for electricity. These included:

• Development of the world’s first fully-integrated carbon capture and storage validation project at AEP’s Mountaineer Plant in West Virginia.  
• Construction of the nation’s only ultra-supercritical pulverized coal plant in southwest Arkansas to meet growing demand in that region. The John W. Turk Plant, which is nearly complete, will be the most efficient coal plant in the country and the only use of this technology in the United States.

 

Nick Akins is president and chief executive officer of American Electric Power. He is AEP’s 10th president and sixth CEO in the company’s more than 100-year history. 

Akins is a seasoned energy executive with vast experience in all aspects of the business from system planning and operations and mergers and acquisitions to running a regional utility and overseeing regulatory relationships. Akins was president and chief operating officer for Southwestern Electric Power Company, serving approximately 439,000 customers in Louisiana, Arkansas and northeast Texas. Named to the position in 2004, he had authority for distribution operations and a wide range of customer and regulatory relationships.

Prior to this, Akins served as vice president – Energy Marketing Services, where he was responsible for directing the activities of Market Development, including the transmission marketing and services functions, Energy Delivery External Affairs including community affairs, economic development, advocacy for regulatory and legislative positions within Energy Delivery. Additional responsibilities included the development and implementation of strategies for energy delivery related to AEP’s entry into regional transmission organizations.

Akins was also vice president – Industry Restructuring for AEP responsible for enterprise-wide program management for restructuring initiatives in preparation for customer choice in AEP’s various jurisdictions.

Before CSW’s merger with AEP, Akins held various director and manager roles with responsibility for mergers and acquisitions, industry restructuring, fuels, system dispatch operations and system planning.

A native of Louisiana, Akins received his bachelor’s degree in 1982 in electric engineering from Louisiana Tech University in Ruston and a master’s degree in electrical engineering in 1986 from Louisiana Tech. Additional training includes executive management programs at Louisiana State University, the University of Idaho and the Reactor Technology Course for Utility Executives at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a professional registered engineer in Texas.

Akins currently serves as vice chairman of the board of the Electric Power Research Institute. He is a member of the boards of the National Association of Manufacturers, the Mid-Ohio Food Bank, the Greater Columbus Arts Council and the Wexner Center for the Arts. He also serves on several subsidiary boards of AEP.

Akins and his wife, Donna, live in Dublin, Ohio. They have two adult sons, Matthew and Christopher.