Entergy CEO says costs won’t go up because of AWS

VICKSBURG, Miss. (VDN) — Entergy Mississippi CEO Haley Fisackerly addressed the Vicksburg Rotary Club Thursday, June 4, and said Amazon Web Services prepaid for Entergy upgrades and costs are not passed on to consumers.

“There’s a lot on people’s minds. There’s a lot happening in our industry. There’s a lot happening in your community. There’s a lot of information, and there’s a lot of misinformation,” said Fisackerly to the club members concerning the impending AWS data center construction in Vicksburg.

Fisackerly insisted Vicksburg’s vicinity to the river and the subsequent port was vital in bringing industries, not only AWS, to the area.

“It’s important to us because of the river, and what it is going to be, one of the next hot spots in the State of Mississippi, from a growth perspective, because of what’s happening along that river, and the county’s effort, and the city’s efforts around building that port. I can’t tell you how many companies I’m talking to that are really interested in coming here. And so we’d like to build support the buildup of that,” he said.

According to the CEO, Entergy employs  2,300 residents of Mississippi and is the largest tax payer in the Magnolia State.

“We pay $9,000,000 a year in taxes, and we’ll be paying more taxes,” he said. “When the power plant is built here soon,” he said.

Fisackerly said Vicksburg will be the site of a new “superpower plant” capable of using groundbreaking new methods of producing power. The plant will be able to produce power using standard methods of burning both fuel and natural gas, but also have the capability of using hydrogen.

“The new Vicksburg advanced power station is a $13 billion investment we’re making,” he said. “It will be able to use hydrogen, to blend in the fuel, to make it cleaner, and we were pursuing carbon capture.”

The CEO of Entergy also pointed out this will be the first power plant built in Mississippi in over 50 years. However, Fisackerly said the plant comes at a high cost.

“Well we did have a very valuable instrument called the early site program. And that was a 20 year license, very costly. It cost $120 million. That’s the engineering geotechnical study that had to be done and is what is required to build the plant. It was up for expiration next year. So we are going through a process. Very close to getting it wrapped up, where we’re going to be granted an extension of that early site permit, and the Trump administration has assisted in this effort. We were going to have to go back and redo the work. Why do we need to spend another $120 million?” he said. “We’re now going to have to go through a process of renewal, where we only to have to spend about $20 million.”

Fisackerly explained the need for the updated plant is not only to support the data centers which are being built in Mississippi but also to serve customer needs and prevent outages. One of the biggest threats is the strengthening thunderstorms which pass through the state.

“We’re seeing thunderstorms, as you all know very well, packing 80 mile per hour winds. That’s a Cat. One hurricane,” he said. “Mother Nature is much more difficult than we are.”

Fisackerly explained data centers are not driving the costs of electricity higher.

“So, when people are wondering if data centers are driving electricity costs up. I want to use this very simple form. The cost of electricity, all those goods we have to buy, people we have to employ to work, the taxes we have to pay, all the fees for permitting, all of this adds to the cost of our business,” he said.

Entergy needed to grow the business to earn a profit without passing the costs to customers so they partnered with AWS in order to achieve the growth according to Fisackerly.

“What’s happened to bring this project about was speed to market. They, as in AWS, provides data services to other companies around the world. They’re the largest provider of data services in the world. You may sit here, and think I don’t use data centers. How many of you have you streamed at home? How many of you have smartphones? How many of you bank online? How many of you shop online? You’re using data centers,” he said. “Amazon has to build these data centers to provide the support.”

Despite claims AWS was exempted from regulatory state processes to build the centers, Fisackerly said the company was given an expedited process.

“What the legislature did was approve the expedited regulatory process. This is critical to the state. When there is a priority, you move it to the front line to get through. They did not get exempted from a process. They got accelerated through. The investments we make, we would normally have to go through a one year to 18 month process, just to prove the need for the power plants and investments. Well, I think we’ve proved this, right? The legislature can grant that, so they did,” he explained.

The partnership has contracts that will allow improvements to Entergy without the costs being passed off to consumers.

“And guess what? Because of AWS, the revenue they’re bringing into this company, we’re gonna increase our liability plan that was a 5 year plan for $600 million. We’re increasing that by over 50% up to a billion dollars. And that increase is being covered 100% by revenues from AWS. We’re going to go after the biggest grid improvement in the company’s history, reduce outages by 50% at no cost to you. Right. That is what I’m excited about. And here’s the other way we protect you as well. Everything in these contracts guarantees AWS is bringing $2 billion. This is $2 billion that is not going to be in your bills over the next 20 years. That is being avoided,” he said.

Fisackerly assured all costs are being paid upfront by AWS and consumers are not paying for the improvements to the electricy grid.

“And finally, we give you protections by this. What requirements are they paying for? They have put up all the upfront costs, the equipment we had to use, the transmission, the substations, all of that is 100% covered by AWS,” said Fisackerly.