Louisiana regulators gave the go-ahead Wednesday for the region’s dominant utility, Entergy, to build three new natural gas-fired power plants and a power line to reel in a new customer — a $10 billion Meta data center that will span more than 2,000 acres in rural northeastern Louisiana.
The state’s Public Service Commission voted 4-1 to approve a settlement agreement that clears the way for the gas plants at an estimated cost of more than $3 billion.
Commissioner Davante Lewis, a Democrat, said the plan by New Orleans-based Entergy and the settlement signed onto by state officials, the Sierra Club and Walmart didn’t go far enough to protect electricity consumers across the state from the financial risks of the project.
“When evaluating all the costs, the benefits, positives and negatives, certainties and uncertainties associated with this deal, I am still left struggling with some fundamental questions,” Lewis said. “I cannot say with enough certainty that this deal and its power agreement serves the greater good.”
