Published in Business and Finance on Friday, June 24th 2011 at 2:20 GMT by Market Wire
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Entergy Louisiana to Build State-of-the-Art Generation Unit at Ninemile Point Plant -- BATON ROUGE, La., June 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

Entergy Louisiana to Build State-of-the-Art Generation Unit at Ninemile Point Plant

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550-megawatt natural gas unit will replace output of existing Ninemile Units 1 and 2, provide clean, efficient and flexible generation alternatives

BATON ROUGE, La., June 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- In a move to upgrade its generation fleet and meet long-term electricity needs for customers, Entergy Louisiana, LLC, a subsidiary of Entergy Corporation (NYSE: [ ETR ]), has asked the Louisiana Public Service Commission for approval to build a new, nominally sized 550-megawatt natural gas unit at its existing Ninemile Point plant in Westwego, La.

The state-of-the-art combined-cycle gas turbine unit will use modern pollution controls and CCGT technology to produce highly efficient, clean and reliable power, and will cost approximately $721 million to construct. The unit will leverage modern technology to help meet regional power supply needs in southeast Louisiana, enhance service reliability in the area and provide significant economic benefits to Jefferson Parish and its adjoining communities.

"This investment in a modern, clean and efficient plant will help us meet our customers' needs for economic electricity in a growing region," said Bill Mohl, president and chief executive officer of Entergy Louisiana. "As one of the most efficient gas-fired units in the Entergy fleet, Ninemile 6 could produce fuel savings for customers ranging from $26 million to $53 million per year."

Ninemile 6 will add needed economic and efficient power to the electricity resources serving the Amite South region of southeast Louisiana, including Entergy Gulf States Louisiana and Entergy New Orleans, which will purchase a portion of its output. The Amite South region encompasses the area from east of the Baton Rouge metropolitan area to the Mississippi state line and south to the Gulf of Mexico, including metropolitan New Orleans. By 2015, the region will have more than 6,000 megawatts of demand.

The project is expected to create significant short- and long-term economic benefits for Jefferson Parish and surrounding communities. Jefferson Parish will benefit from increased sales and tax revenues as well as the projected creation of as many as several hundred construction jobs at the peak of activity. Approximately 17 new long-term positions also will be created at the Ninemile site to operate the new Unit 6.

If approved, the construction project for Ninemile unit 6 will begin in 2012, and the unit will enter commercial operation by mid-2015 with capacity sufficient to replace the loss of Ninemile Units 1 and 2, which came online in the early 1950s and have been deactivated. Ninemile 6 will use portions of the site's existing infrastructure, reducing overall construction costs.

The Ninemile 6 design has built-in flexibility, allowing it to adjust its output to meet demand as a load-following plant or operate around the clock as a base load plant if required. While the unit is designed to use natural gas as its main fuel, it will also be able to use ultralow sulfur fuel oil for short periods. Additionally, locating a large generator like Ninemile 6 close to load enhances flexibility during system restoration following a major storm event such as a hurricane.

Through its advanced pollution-control systems, the unit will be among the cleanest gas-fired generating plants in the nation, and its emissions will be significantly lower than the Ninemile Point units, which have been deactivated. The plant also will add an additional clean-generating resource to Entergy's portfolio of plants, furthering the company's position as one of the cleanest electric utilities in the country. Entergy's fleet emits significantly lower amounts of carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide than the average utility in the country.

"We are committed to providing reliable, dependable and economical energy for our customers today and tomorrow," Mohl said. "The technology chosen for the generation of that energy also must be reliable and economical. As a CCGT unit, Ninemile 6 will be a basic building block for Entergy's long-term generation strategy to meet customer needs cleanly, economically and efficiently."

Entergy's long-term resource planning strategy continues to focus on delivering efficient, reliable, and low-cost electricity to customers. Implementation of this strategy includes building a new CCGT at the Ninemile Point site, acquiring CCGT units that are for sale when the purchase is economical and would meet reliability needs, and entering into long-term agreements with suppliers of efficient, lower-cost power. Ninemile 6 was one of several proposals selected from the summer 2009 competitive procurement process to add long-term resources to help meet specific reliability needs in southeast Louisiana.

Since the end of 2002, Entergy has added over 4,200 megawatts of long-term capacity. Over 2,400 megawatts of this efficient and clean generation is serving Louisiana customers today.

Entergy Louisiana has selected subsidiaries of the Shaw Group Inc. as the engineering, procurement and construction contractor for the construction of Ninemile 6. Shaw will work in conjunction with an in-house management team for the project.

Entergy Louisiana, LLC and Entergy Gulf States Louisiana, L.L.C. serve more than one million customers. With operations in southern, central and northeastern Louisiana, the companies are part of Entergy Corp.'s electric system serving 2.7 million customers in Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi and Texas.

[ entergy-louisiana.com ]

Twitter: @EntergyMediaLA

In this news release, and from time to time, Entergy Corporation makes certain "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Except to the extent required by the federal securities laws, Entergy undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.

Forward-looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties. There are factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements, including (a) those factors discussed in: (i) Entergy's Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2010, (ii) Entergy's Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2011, and (iii) Entergy's other reports and filings made under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934; (b) uncertainties associated with rate proceedings, formula rate plans and other cost recovery mechanisms; (c) uncertainties associated with efforts to remediate the effects of major storms and recover related restoration costs; (d) nuclear plant relicensing, operating and regulatory risks, including any changes resulting from the nuclear crisis in Japan following its catastrophic earthquake and tsunami; (e) legislative and regulatory actions; and (f) conditions in commodity and capital markets during the periods covered by the forward-looking statements, in addition to other factors described elsewhere in this news release and in subsequent securities filings.

SOURCE Entergy Corporation

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