NEW YORK (Standard&Poor's) Oct. 31, 2011--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services has assigned its 'BBB' issuer credit rating to East Kentucky Power Cooperative Inc. (EKPC). The outlook is stable. EKPC is a generation and transmission (G&T) cooperative. Its 16 distribution members serve about 520,000 retail customers in 87 of Kentucky's 120 counties. In 2010, the cooperative was among the 10 largest G&T cooperatives in the U.S. as measured by member energy sales. Member sales accounted for about 96% of 2010's energy sales and residential customers represented nearly 75% of energy sales and revenues, which contributes to revenue stream predictability and stability. "However, compared with cooperative utilities with autonomous ratemaking authority, state rate regulation and exposure to adversarial rate proceedings
