In addition to the financial risks for residents we’ve already highlighted, the testimony calls attention to another big risk to residents: the risk of a failing electricity system.
His findings raised major red flags about the cost, scale and speed of this project—and the lack of transparency and analysis around it. Entergy and Meta’s application for new gas plants is currently under review by the Louisiana Public Service Commission, docket U-37425, and we’re expecting Commissioners to make a decision in the Fall.
Imagine a new large city emerged overnight in the town next to you. The city needs more electricity than your town and all the other towns nearby. The city has a plan for generating electricity; city officials decide YOU will pay for most of it. Not only will you pay for the new city’s electricity, but your own utility services will be impacted. Before you know it, your lights start flickering, the water in your faucet runs brown and faint, and the air inside your home fills with dust particles.
You’re both angry and baffled. City officials shrug and declare it’s an unfortunate byproduct of strengthening our economy. This city isn’t even for people, it’s for computers. That’s essentially what’s happening in Richland Parish.
In other words: a space roughly 1/3 of the French Quarter would need the same energy as the WHOLE of Orleans Parish. It’s like building the power impact of a large city overnight in the middle of nowhere.
AI data centers like Meta’s are not traditional, steady energy users. Their loads can change rapidly, sometimes spiking or dropping in ways that current utility planning tools aren’t equipped to predict. Our expert warned that these kinds of sudden surges could have serious impacts on the wider grid—not just at the data center site, but across Louisiana and even in neighboring states. Meaning your lights and light bill could be affected.
Just last month, more than 30,000 residents in Caddo and Bossier parishes lost electricity when at least one power plant went offline and caused massive grid instability. SPP, the regional electricity grid operator, ordered local electricity provider, SWEPCO, to cut power to residents in order to prevent larger, more widespread outages.
When massive power users go off the grid suddenly, it causes fluctuations in the electricity voltage running through wires to your house. At least one plant went offline and 30,000 residents lost power for more than 4 hours. The exact same thing could happen if a power user 10x the size, like Meta, disconnects from the grid.
Virginia narrowly avoided a mass blackout event last year when 60 data centers suddenly went offline.
In technical terms, ELL’s application failed to adequately assess thermal, voltage, and transient stability risks. These are critical grid reliability measures. This kind of dynamic load behavior isn’t just a technical detail. It could cause flickering lights and damage to devices in nearby homes and businesses, or worse—it could trigger problems at the Grand Gulf nuclear power plant nearby in Mississippi. It’s a big deal and Entergy hasn’t done enough homework to understand the risks or costs.
Entergy has proposed building a variety of new generation resources, transmission facilities, and substation projects to serve the Meta project. The costs of building out this infrastructure is in the hundreds of millions. Under the current application Meta would pay for the “Substation and Point-of-Delivery projects, but all ratepayers would be financially responsible for the System Improvement Projects.” That’s a fancy way of saying we’re footing the majority of the bill.
As part of their application, Entergy is asking regulators to approve construction of a third large gas plant in southern Louisiana. Our expert questioned whether this plant is truly needed, given the already massive infrastructure build-out underway for Meta.
With so many unanswered questions and potential risks, approving another gas plant may simply pile on costs for Louisiana residents—without a clear public benefit.
Meta’s data center could bring massive and unpredictable strain to Louisiana’s electric grid and to residents’ wallets. Yet Entergy’s plan underestimates the transmission challenges, glosses over critical reliability concerns, and offers little assurance that residents won’t be stuck paying the price for a deal made behind closed doors.
Before this project moves forward, we need full transparency, serious technical analysis, and a commitment to pursue less risky renewable energy options.
