September 30, 2026 · Elkhart · Marion · AES INDIANA

AES Indiana BlackRock Buyout Reaches FERC While a $71 Million Rate Case Waits Until 2027

The AES Indiana BlackRock buyout faces a federal challenge while AES Indiana's $71 million rate increase waits for a March 2027 IURC hearing in Indianapolis.

Daniel BurkePublished every day

The AES Indiana BlackRock buyout landed in front of federal regulators on September 28, when Senator Elizabeth Warren and two Indiana Representatives asked FERC to reject the $33.4 billion take-private of AES Corporation, the parent company of the utility serving Indianapolis and Marion County. That federal fight runs on its own clock, separate from the utility's own rate case, and both clocks reach into your budget this year.

AES Indiana BlackRock Buyout Faces Bipartisan FERC Challenge

The letter to FERC Chair Laura Swett came from Warren, Democrat André Carson, and Republican Victoria Spartz. The buyers are Global Infrastructure Partners, a BlackRock subsidiary, and EQT. GIP also closed a $40 billion purchase of Aligned Data Centers, and the lawmakers argue an owner on both sides could favor grid upgrades that serve its own affiliated data centers while every other customer, including your plant, shares the bill. Two more groups have joined a formal protest at FERC: the Independent Market Monitor for PJM and the Private Equity Stakeholder Project. Both are questioning whether BlackRock's existing blanket approval covers this kind of active utility ownership. AES says no deal costs will land on Indiana ratepayers, and AES Indiana stays state-regulated no matter how the ownership question resolves.

Two Regulators, Two Clocks, No Coordination

AES Indiana's $71 million rate increase doesn't get reconsidered by the IURC until March 2027. FERC review, CFIUS review, antitrust review and New York regulators are still working through the ownership deal on a separate timeline. Ohio regulators and AES shareholders have already signed off. Pull your AES Indiana load forecast and tariff class now, and if FERC attaches conditions to the deal before March, ask your industrial-customer group or counsel whether those conditions belong in the IURC rehearing.

Patrick Industries RV Merger Talks Shadow Elkhart Product Launch

At Elkhart's RV Dealer Open House, Patrick Industries showed a machine at its Edwardsburg, Michigan operation that prints a finished design onto an interior panel in one pass. Buyers stayed cautious. RVIA wholesale shipments fell 16.4% year over year in August, down to 23,599 units, and Patrick confirmed June 30 that it's in merger talks with LCI Industries. If that deal closes, you'd have a roughly $8.1 billion supplier across panels, flooring and printed décor selling to OEMs like Thor and Forest River, and nobody at this week's Open House can say what that does to your pricing over the next 18 to 24 months.

Accu Opens Indianapolis Shop as CAFE Rollback Gives Auto Suppliers a Longer Runway

Accu, a U.K. fastener company, is opening its first U.S. shop in Indianapolis, one more local fastener source for plants in Marion County to add to their bid list. Separately, the administration's new fuel economy standards reportedly drop the fleet target to about 34.5 mpg by 2031, more than 30% below the Biden-era goal of 50.4. That eases one federal push toward EV parts and gives Indiana's ICE and hybrid suppliers a longer runway, but OEM platform decisions and other federal and state rules still stand, and the rule's own status is unsettled. Keep your EV tooling on the books and ask your OEM customers whether their 2028 to 2031 sourcing plans actually changed.

Questions for Your Morning Huddle

Q: Will the AES Indiana BlackRock buyout affect my electric rate this year? A: The buyout review at FERC runs on a separate timeline from AES Indiana's rate case, so the ownership fight itself doesn't change your rate this year. Your rate exposure stays tied to the $71 million increase the IURC won't take up until March 2027.

Q: What's the difference between the FERC review of the AES buyout and the IURC rate case? A: FERC reviews whether GIP and EQT can legally take AES Corporation private and whether GIP's separate ownership of Aligned Data Centers creates a conflict. The IURC sets AES Indiana's allowed rates and reviews the $71 million increase on its own schedule, regardless of how the ownership question resolves.

Q: Should Indiana RV suppliers worry about the Patrick Industries LCI merger talks? A: Yes. The talks could create a roughly $8.1 billion supplier while RV wholesale shipments are already down 16.4% year over year, and that combination usually shows up in supplier pricing. Check your supply agreements now for price-reopener or change-of-control clauses before a merged supplier comes back to the table.

If you want a deeper look at how a rate case actually works and what it costs to intervene in one, read our guide to utility rate case intervention for C&I operators. For more on how AES Indiana's rate increase reached this point, see AES Indiana's Rate Increase, ThyssenKrupp Terre Haute, and Michigan's EV Play.

Watch this TEG Daily on YouTube at TEG-PENDING-YOUTUBE-URL.

01Indianapolis

Bipartisan Letter Pushes FERC to Reject AES/BlackRock-GIP Buyout

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), joined by Indiana Reps. André Carson (D) and Victoria Spartz (R), sent a Sept. 28, 2026 letter to FERC Chair Laura Swett urging rejection of Global Infrastructure Partners' (a BlackRock subsidiary) and EQT's $33.4 billion take-private of AES Corp, parent of AES Indiana and AES Ohio. The deal, announced March 2, 2026 at $15/share, has already cleared AES's shareholder vote (June 26) and Ohio's PUCO, but still needs FERC, NYPSC, CFIUS and HSR sign-off before a targeted late-2026/early-2027 close.

Impact: GIP's parallel, already-closed $40 billion acquisition of Aligned Data Centers means BlackRock/GIP would simultaneously own AES Indiana's wires and buy the power those wires deliver to hyperscale tenants, a conflict PJM's Independent Market Monitor and the Private Equity Stakeholder Project have formally flagged in a FERC protest challenging whether BlackRock's existing Section 203 blanket authorization still covers active utility ownership at this scale. That federal fight is running on a parallel track with AES Indiana's own pending $71 million rate increase, which the IURC won't rehear until March 2027, two regulatory processes, no coordination between them.
Watch: FERC's ruling (or deficiency letter) on the Section 203 application, and the March 2027 IURC reconsideration hearing on AES Indiana's $71 million rate case.
For the huddle: If FERC approves the deal with conditions attached, could AES Indiana's grid capital plans get disrupted mid-rate-case, and how would that affect service reliability and future rate requests for our plants?

02Elkhart · Elkhart

Patrick Industries Debuts Direct-to-Panel Printing at Elkhart RV Open House

At this week's RV Dealer Open House in Elkhart, Patrick Industries unveiled a machine that prints finished designs directly onto RV interior panels in one pass, according to COO Hugo Gonzalez, while Addex Outdoors showed off a pull-behind camper built to tow behind a Jeep as buyers balk at $35,000-$65,000 overland rig prices, per territory manager Cutter Watson.

Impact: The innovation storyline masks real volume stress: RVIA-tracked wholesale shipments fell 16.4% year-over-year in August 2026 to 23,599 units, and Patrick is simultaneously in merger talks with LCI Industries (Lippert) that would create an approximately $8.1 billion combined 'super-supplier' with dominant leverage over interior panel, flooring, and now printed-décor pricing for OEM customers like Thor Industries and Forest River. Dealers shopping the Open House for affordable, differentiated product have no visibility into how that pending consolidation could reshape their supplier options and cost basis within 18-24 months.
Watch: Regulatory or shareholder movement on the Patrick Industries-LCI Industries merger (confirmed June 30) and RVIA's next wholesale shipment forecast update.
For the huddle: If Patrick and LCI merge into a single dominant interior-materials supplier, where are our purchase agreements exposed to a single-source price increase on panels, flooring, or trim?

03Marion · Indianapolis

U.K. Fastener Distributor Accu Opens First U.S. Hub in Indianapolis

Huddersfield, England-based Accu opened a 10,000-square-foot distribution center at 501 Pennsylvania Parkway in Indianapolis in late September 2026, naming Giovanni Cespedes (formerly of Charlotte's Falcon Fastenings and TR Fastenings) as Managing Director of Accu Inc. VP Daniel Ackroyd said 'changes in the global trade environment' accelerated the move, with the facility serving Accu's aerospace, automotive, electronics, robotics and medical-technology customers across North America.

Impact: The published address sits in a north-side office/flex-park on the I-465 corridor, not a traditional bulk-warehouse submarket, a format more consistent with a managed or shared 3PL arrangement than a standalone dedicated facility, meaning Accu's actual Day 1 inventory depth may be far thinner than the 'distribution centre' label suggests. Accu also lands just 20 miles from Würth Industry North America's Greenwood headquarters (420,000+ SKUs, IoT-enabled bins already in Midwest OEM plants), and its new Managing Director brings direct customer knowledge from TR Fastenings/Trifast plc, a rival that's been navigating revenue declines and CFO turnover, putting Indianapolis at the center of an increasingly contested fastener corridor.
Watch: Whether Accu signs a dedicated warehouse lease as it scales beyond its initial flex-space footprint, and any hiring announcements beyond Ackroyd's 'coming months' pledge.
For the huddle: Given Accu's Indianapolis entry and Würth's existing Greenwood presence, is there an opening to renegotiate our fastener sourcing terms as competition intensifies in our own backyard?

04Statewide

Trump Rolls Back CAFE Standards, Touts $100B Auto Investment Including Indiana

President Trump announced Saturday via Truth Social that his administration approved new, looser fuel economy standards replacing Biden-era rules that had targeted roughly 50.4 mpg fleetwide by 2031, and touted more than $100 billion in auto investment plus new and expanded plants supporting jobs in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and South Carolina. Trump said, 'Every manufacturer, from General Motors to Ford to Stellantis, has called me wanting to build here, and now they can!' and credited Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick; GM and Stellantis shares closed 3% higher and Ford gained about 1%, while Tesla fell 2%.

Impact: The new rule reportedly drops the fleetwide light-duty target to roughly 34.5 mpg by 2031, more than a 30% cut from the Biden-era number, and eliminates CAFE credit trading, a structural change that cuts off a revenue stream Tesla built selling compliance credits to ICE-heavy automakers while removing the regulatory forcing function that had pushed suppliers toward EV-compatible parts. Stellantis is already the clearest Indiana beneficiary, having committed $100 million at its Kokomo plant to produce the GMET4 EVO four-cylinder engine starting in 2026, meaning ICE and hybrid component production, not EV tooling, is the near-term winner in Indiana's supply base.
Watch: Pending litigation (California's suit against EPA in D.D.C. (Case No. 1:26-cv-02185)) that could restore state-level emissions standards and force automakers back into dual-engineering.
For the huddle: Do we have capital already committed to EV-specific tooling that's now at risk of being stranded if OEM demand shifts back toward ICE and hybrid powertrains through 2031?

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