NEW ORLEANS — Entergy announced that agreements with major technology companies developing data centers across Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi are projected to generate approximately $5 billion in savings for 2.3 million utility customers over the next two decades.
The savings are tied to power service agreements supporting large-scale data center developments that have been announced across the three states since 2024. The projections follow regulatory approval or acknowledgment from public service commissions in each state.
“We proactively worked with our state leaders to recruit a new industry with attractive power agreements that protect and benefit our existing customers,” said Drew Marsh, chair and chief executive officer of Entergy.
Data center projects announced across the Entergy region include facilities from Amazon Web Services in Mississippi, Meta in Louisiana, Avaio Digital in Mississippi and Arkansas, Google in Arkansas and Hut 8 in Louisiana. In total, the projects are expected to generate about $47 billion in regional investment along with thousands of technology jobs and expanded tax revenue for local governments.
Entergy said the savings will be delivered through several mechanisms, including reduced impacts from new grid infrastructure investments, a smaller share of generation costs for residential customers and lower fees tied to storm recovery and resilience improvements.
Mississippi customers are expected to see more than $2 billion in savings tied to new data center developments, including Amazon Web Services projects that are helping offset the costs of replacing aging power plants and funding additional grid reliability upgrades.
Arkansas customers are projected to receive up to $1.7 billion in savings tied to Google and Avaio Digital projects, including support for a new 600-megawatt solar facility and a 350-megawatt battery storage installation that will supply energy to the Entergy Arkansas grid.
Louisiana customers are projected to receive approximately $800 million in savings, including reductions in storm recovery and grid resilience costs linked to Meta’s data center development in Rayville.
Entergy executives said the agreements are structured to require data center operators to cover the direct costs of serving their facilities while also contributing additional benefits to existing customers.
The company also introduced a framework called “Fair Share Plus,” a set of guiding principles for future data center agreements designed to ensure large electricity users cover infrastructure costs, maintain grid reliability and provide measurable benefits to residential and business customers on the same system.
“State leaders made it very clear to us that protecting and benefiting existing electric customers in our agreements should be our overriding goal, and we have carried that directive in our guiding principles,” Marsh said.
Entergy said the savings estimates are based on projected revenues from data center contracts compared with the incremental cost of serving those customers, including generation and transmission infrastructure investments.
Company officials said regulatory oversight in the three states has helped ensure large-scale data center growth does not negatively impact electric reliability or pricing for existing customers while supporting economic development across the region.