The Council opened a new docket to evaluate ways to increase the availability of distributed energy resources and create a vendor-neutral distributed battery and microgrid program (consent agenda item 24).
This vote follows a proposal from Together New Orleans and the Alliance for Affordable Energy asking the Council to invest up to $32 million in battery systems across homes and community resilience hubs, without raising customers’ bills. The goal of our proposal, as well as the new docket, is to provide reliable backup power during outages and offer everyday grid support. The initiating resolution, R-24-624, was already approved by the Council’s Climate Change & Sustainability Committee on October 9, and it has now received final approval from the full Council.
The Council also voted to approve resolution R-24-625, which allocates a $100M investment for Entergy New Orleans to upgrade and harden power poles (consent agenda item 25). This resolution was also initially approved by the Council’s Climate Change & Sustainability Committee on October 9. The cost of this investment won’t impact your bills, since the Council was able to secure a settlement from Entergy earlier this year to resolve other issues.
The next New Orleans City Council meeting is scheduled for November 7, 2024. We’ll share information about energy items on the agenda that could affect you on our social media after the Council posts the agenda.