COLUMBUS, Ohio, June 29, 2006 – The new AEP SkyBand, which encircles the top of the 31-story American Electric Power (NYSE: AEP) headquarters building at 1 Riverside Plaza, will be unveiled July 3 during Red, White & BOOM! immediately before the fireworks.

“The AEP SkyBand is the crowning feature of new signage on our corporate headquarters to more clearly identify the building and add visual interest to the Columbus skyline,” said Nicholas J. Ashooh, vice president, Corporate Communications for AEP. “We’re delighted to introduce it to the community as part of Red, White & BOOM!”

The programmable AEP SkyBand can display more than one million color combinations and a variety of special effects. It does not display text messages.

The band was constructed in 86 sections. Each section weighs about 15 pounds, and the average length is 6 feet. Each foot contains 30 light-emitting diodes (LEDs).

“The LEDs use only about 20 percent of the energy that neon signs use to create the same effect,” Ashooh said.

In addition to the AEP SkyBand, the new signage includes a 30-by-30-foot, back-lit AEP parallelogram logo sign on the building’s northwest face and three 15-by-15-foot, back-lit logo signs on the southwest, southeast and north faces of the building at rooftop level. The largest sign weighs more than 10,000 pounds and uses 36 400-watt metal halide frosted lamps.

LE Concepts of Columbus designed the AEP signage project. YESCO of Las Vegas manufactured the signage. It was installed by Da-Nite Sign Co. of Columbus. Also on the design and construction team were Columbus-based firms Ralph & Curl Engineers, general contractor, and Korda/Nemeth Engineering, engineering contractor.

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 36,000 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 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 Texas). American Electric Power, based in Columbus, Ohio, is celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2006.