Bryan, Ohio

Published February 2014

Exterior of the Bryan Municipal Utilities building, a brick facility with a covered entrance, landscaped shrubs and an American flag flying in front.

The city of Bryan is a community at the center of life in northwestern Ohio, located just minutes from Michigan and Indiana.

Bryan has always been famous for its water. In fact, there were once so many flowing artesian wells in Bryan that it became known as “Fountain City” soon after its founding in 1840. The city is located above the MICHINDOH Glacial Aquifer, an extensive sand and gravel aquifer system that provides residents in the area with an abundant source of water.

Bryan was incorporated first as a village in 1841, and reincorporated as a city 100 years later in 1941. The city now seamlessly combines tradition with progress and has a population of more than 8,500.

Representing small-town America
One of the greatest assets of Bryan is its ability to combine the friendliness and charm of a small town with the conveniences of a large city.

Bryan is located in the heart of the industrial Midwest. Its strong school system, downtown shopping district, and extensive park system all combine to make Bryan a unique and desirable city. Norman Crampton ranked Bryan 30th in his book “The 100 Best Small Towns in America.”

Bryan has also been named a Tree City USA for the past 25 years by the Arbor Foundation for its commitment to caring for and maintaining public trees.

Reliable, renewable public power
Bryan Municipal Utilities (BMU) promotes reliable, green energy. BMU was named a Reliable Power Public Provider (RP3) program recipient by the American Public Power Association, receiving Platinum designation for the fourth consecutive time in 2012. RP3 is recognition for providing consumers with the highest degree of reliable and safe electric service.

BMU was ranked by the Solar Electric Power Association on the 2012 Top 10 list of American electric utilities that have added the most new solar power to their systems and the most solar on a watts-per-customer basis.

In 2010, BMU replaced all Bryan’s streetlights with high efficiency LED lights. The new fixtures reduced energy use by almost 50 percent and resulted in environmental savings of tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

BMU also delivers cable television, Internet and high-speed data to its customers through its fiber-rich communications system.

As a member of AMP, Bryan participates in a number of AMP programs and projects that assist in providing reliable energy and other benefits to the community and its citizen-owners. These include:

  • AMP Fremont Energy Center, a natural gas combined cycle facility that provides energy and capacity
  • Blue Creek Wind Farm, a wind farm in northwest Ohio that helps diversify AMP’s pool of resources providing power to members
  • Business/Economic Development, AMP assistance designed to augment local economic development efforts
  • Direct Connections, which assists municipal electric systems in organizing and/or enhancing and implementing a locally controlled key account, business retention and expansion program
  • Landfill Gas Energy, a mixture of gases produced by decomposing garbage and collected by a series of pipes for use in diesel generator units (landfill gas-to-energy sites directly reduce greenhouse gas emissions)
  • Meldahl/Greenup, which includes a portion of the run-of-the-river hydroelectric generating facility currently under construction at the Captain Anthony Meldahl Dam on the Ohio River and a portion of the existing generating facility at the Greenup Dam, also on the Ohio River
  • Municipal Energy Services Agency (MESA), which provides member communities a source of technical assistance including planning, design and engineering, field services and training assistance
  • Mutual Aid, a network of municipal electric systems that assist each other when utility emergencies occur that are too widespread to be handled by one system alone
  • North Central AMP Service Group (NCASG)
  • New York Power Authority (NYPA), providing hydroelectricity generated by the Niagara and St. Lawrence rivers
  • OMEGA JV4, a joint venture that operates the 69-kV R. Bruce Kidston Transmission Line in Williams County
  • OMEGA JV5, a joint venture that operates a 42-MW hydroelectric plant on the Ohio River and has back-up generation sources located throughout Ohio
  • OSHA compliance, a contractual-based program that expands on the general safety program
  • Phase 1 Hydro, which includes the run-of-the-river generating facilities currently under construction at the Cannelton, Smithland and Willow Island dams on the Ohio River
  • The Prairie State Energy Campus, in southern Illinois, a 1,600-MW state-of-the-art supercritical mine-mouth plant and adjacent coal mine

For more information, please visit www.cityofbryan.com.