The New Orleans City Council has prevailed on a pair of complaints before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) that result in as much as $65-million dollars being returned to Entergy ratepayers.
The two complaints, and a many more, center on the poor service record of the Grand Gulf Nuclear Station.
“These are two claims, but there are several more coming as well. Much more funding that could be coming back to the ratepayers in the City and in Louisiana as well.”
The problem-plagued generating station has gone off line numerous times, leaving Entergy at the mercy of buying pricey spot market electricity on the open market from other generators.
These forays into the open market have cost the company as much as a million dollars week, which has been passed along to consumers.
“We’ve pursued justice and compensation for ratepayers for all the many faults of this plant, and our strength has rallied other regulators to our cause,” Moreno says. “The fight is far from done, but we’ll continue to fight to return every dollar overcharged due to Entergy’s mismanagement of the Grand Gulf plant.”
Grand Gulf supplies one-third of the energy New Orleans uses. But it has failed to work during significant stretches of time over the past several years, costing ratepayers.
When the plant fails to perform, Entergy New Orleans must buy expensive gas-fired replacement electricity from the power markets. By regulatory rule, those costs are passed on to ratepayers.
“What we believe that relates to for the people of New Orleans is roughly $65 million maybe even more,” Moreno says. “Now when exactly those could be put back on people’s bills is still to be determined. Obviously we’d want to do this as quickly as possible. But this a huge win for ratepayers in the City of New Orleans.”