American Electric Power (AEP), one of the largest owners of regulated US utilities, plans to invest $1.8bn in renewables by 2020 and billions more on transmission lines – on top of its advancing 2GW Wind Catcher proposal in Oklahoma.

AEP told investors on Friday that it intends to spend $18.2bn on capital investments over the next three years. Roughly three-quarters of that will go towards power lines, bolstering AEP’s position as the country’s largest transmission-system owner, but the spending programme also includes a special $1.8bn