These companies doing business in Louisiana want to disconnect from pricey utilities
Citing few renewable options and projected price jumps, industries propose their own power generation.
“Horrifying.” That’s what one consumer advocate calls a projected 90% increase in electricity prices for customers of electric utility, Entergy Louisiana, between 2018 and 2030.
Similar spikes in the cost of electricity are happening across the United States driven by the need to run data centers and power-hungry industries, replace old power plants and repair damaged infrastructure from more frequent storms, floods and fires supercharged by climate change.
“Louisiana is a microcosm of what’s happening nationally, but it is happening at a breakneck speed in a way that residents … are not protected. And that is not OK,” said Logan Atkinson Burke, executive director of the nonprofit Alliance for Affordable Energy.
In Oregon, residential rates have increased 50% in the past five years. Residents in 13 mid-Atlantic states will see their bills increase 10% this year. Last month, Florida Power & Light requested an increase of $9 billion — possibly the largest requested rate increase in U.S. history. It would boost power bills for many in the state by 22% according to the watchdog environmental group, Food and Water Watch.
Last year a federal report found that residential electric bills will increase by $122 a year because of the boom of liquefied natural gas export terminals will increase prices for natural gas — used to generate more than 40% of all U.S. electricity.
“The current system is not sustainable,” said Joshua Basseches, an assistant professor of environmental studies and public policy at Tulane University, who argues that new options must be considered on who produces and who pays for electricity. “Otherwise rates will only continue to go up.”
Louisiana’s industries, which use more than 40% of the electricity in the state, say they have a solution: allow them, not Entergy, to build or buy power for some of their needs. The industries also want something Entergy Louisiana does not offer enough of: renewable sources of energy. Louisiana is 44th in the United States for renewable energy generation, with just 3.2% of its electricity coming from wind, solar or hydropower.
“We believe we can do some things to help avoid Entergy having to build some of that generation and do it in a way that benefits all the ratepayers for the most economic development,” said Randy Young, a lawyer for Kean Miller who represents the Large Energy Users Group (LEUG), which consists of 28 companies with 92 facilities across Louisiana including Dow, Monsanto and ExxonMobil.
