On a four to one vote, the Louisiana Public Service Commission approved Entergy Louisiana’s plan to build three natural gas powered turbine generators that will provide power to Meta’s massive data center in Richland Parish. More than a dozen people spoke out against the plan, including Logan Wolf from Thibodaux, who says a data center in Memphis is causing problems.
“Their water system is failing, because of the data center, and how much water it uses to cool the center itself and there is extensive reports of quality of life being affected, because of the shear amount of noise that these data centers produce,” Wolf said.
PSC Member Davante Lewis was the only one commissioner to vote against the plan.
Fellow Democrat, Foster Campbell, voted for it, because he says Meta’s new data center is projected to create more than 500 jobs for an area of the state that desperately needs it.
“I understand these people from New Orleans or wherever they are coming from saying they are against this program, but they don’t live in Lake Providence, Tallulah, Columbia, Monroe or Delhi,” Campbell said.
Opponents are also concerned that Entergy’s plan to power the data center will result in higher bills for Entergy residential customers.
But Entergy’s vice president of regulatory and public affairs, Larry Hand, says Meta will pay most of the bill for the new electric generation, while residential customers might see their bill go up a dollar.
“To think about this transformational, once in a generation investment opportunity and the cost or the benefit of that is plus or minus a dollar, is just absolutely mind blowing that we have this opportunity,” said Hand.
Renee Carthan of Lake Charles also spoke against Entergy’s plan, she’s concerned about higher bills, even if it’s a small increase.
“Even with energy efficient appliances and smart thermostats, I can’t afford for that to go up, even one dollar more, especially knowing that the hard-working citizens of Louisiana are subsidizing expenses of a multi-billion dollar corporation,” Carthan said.
It’s estimated Meta’s data center will need roughly three times the amount of electricity that the city of New Orleans uses in a year. Two of the facilities Entergy will build will be in Richland Parish, the other will be built in St. Charles Parish.
