The City Council, the Utility, Cable, Telecommunications and Technology Committee has voted to approve Entergy New Orleans’ sale of their natural gas business to Bernhard Capital Partners, a Baton Rouge private equity firm. This is noteworthy because Entergy has had a monopoly on home heating and cooling for over 100 years. Change will be good for New Orleanians because it will allow Entergy to focus on what our community needs most: electrification of the city and hardening of the power grid to make our city more resilient to storms and severe weather.
Opposing voices at the meeting pushed the Council to block the deal to allow the City, not Bernhard, to spend taxpayer money to purchase Entergy’s gas business, so it can be shut it down by 2035. This, they said, is best for reducing carbon emissions from the gas utility.
Opposition to the sale is being led by the Alliance for Affordable Energy, an organization I used to run. The Alliance has raised valid concerns, namely that there will likely be rate increases. And, as more of the city moves away from gas to electricity there will be a cost shift onto gas customers left on the system. But this will happen regardless of who owns the gas utility.
The Alliance is urging the city to purchase the gas utility so it has control and can refuse service to everyone because they seem to believe that forced electrification is the best way to limit carbon emissions. If gas can’t be bought, then people will have to switch to electricity. The idea that New Orleans should spend hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to municipalize the gas utility only to shut it down is extreme.
While I support electrification of New Orleans, I oppose forcing people into it. Residents and businesses should be incentivized to replace their gas HVACs, stoves, and water heaters by offering financial and technical help through our energy efficiency programs. Otherwise, people will be slammed with a massive financial burden, one which our city’s low-income residents and small businesses will not be able to overcome.
Unfortunately, many of the speakers at the meeting did not seem to understand that they were advocating against their own interests. One gentleman said he opposed the sale because his house used natural gas for his heating, hot water, and cooking, and the sale made him worry about gas prices rising. But, if the plan to block Entergy’s sale and municipalize the gas company was successful, he would be forced to replace ALL those appliances in his home AND he would have had to pay higher gas bills for a decade, as the city coped with the steady loss of customers and until finally closing the gas utility.
Other opponents expressed concerns that this sale would slow New Orlean’s environmental goals and the city’s path to electrification – yet that is also not true. Entergy can likely be trusted to get behind an electrification effort since they won’t be competing against themselves for customers. Further, the city can boost electrification efforts by transitioning the city’s vehicle fleet and public transportation to electric.
To be frank, some voices in the community dislike Entergy, and for-profit companies in general, so they oppose anything Entergy proposes simply to thwart Entergy even when the proposal will help ratepayers. It’s a case of cutting off a nose to spite the face. But we cannot allow professional naysayers who prioritize personal grievances over our economic wellbeing. We are all highly dependent on electricity – it is an apex service – and we need voices who understand the full picture of what is at stake.
I am relieved and proud of our City Council for advancing the goals of electrification without punishing us with a risky gas municipalization and a ban. Please contact the members of the City Council Utility, Cable, Telecommunications and Technology Committee to thank them for standing up for us against intense criticism.