Tech
Entergy Broke Ground. The Aquifer Simulation Stayed Quiet.
Meta's Richland Parish permit authorizes 23 million gallons a day while operations claim 1.5 million in use; LSU's 17-year simulation puts the aquifer 65 feet lower at maximum draw. The March 2026 revised deal commits Meta to 20 years of infrastructure coverage on plants built to last 30.
Entergy Louisiana broke ground at Richland Parish on December 1, its Franklin Farms Power Station scheduled to deliver 1,500 megawatts to Meta's Hyperion campus by late 2028.
Meta first announced the site in December 2024 at $10 billion. The investment has since grown to $27 billion, and the footprint exceeds 4 million square feet.
The Water Permit
Meta holds a state permit to draw up to 23 million gallons of water per day from the Mississippi River Alluvial Aquifer. The company says actual operations will consume roughly 1.5 million gallons per day.
Frank Tsairan, Director of the Louisiana Water Resources Research Institute at LSU, ran a 17-year simulation at maximum permitted withdrawal. Groundwater levels could fall more than 65 feet beneath some areas of the facility.
The alluvial aquifer's water table currently sits less than 30 feet below land surface across northeast Louisiana, per USGS data. A 65-foot drawdown exceeds that depth more than twice over. About 50 domestic and agricultural wells sit within a mile of Meta's perimeter.
Christopher Dalbom, Director of the Institute on Water Resources Law and Policy at Tulane Law School, told WBRZ the structure creates no incentive for Meta to use less water. "They don't have to pay for it," he said.
What the LPSC Filed
The August 2025 LPSC approval included a number absent from Meta's press materials: ratepayers would carry at least $470 million for a 60-mile 500kV line needed solely for the campus. Earthjustice petitioned for an investigation in January 2026. The LPSC declined on February 25.
The March 2026 revised deal restructured the cost ledger. Meta agreed to fund 240 miles of new 500kV lines under a 20-year electric service agreement, alongside seven gas plants and battery storage at three sites. The Pelican Institute reviewed the structure and found more information was needed before ratepayer protection could be confirmed.
The gas plants the deal covers carry 30-year operational lifespans; the ESA runs 20. If Meta exits at year 20, the final decade of plant costs falls to ratepayers with no contractual backstop.
In December 2025, the LPSC passed the "Lightning Amendment," fast-tracking large-load certifications and removing the requirement to prove least-cost generation options, a consumer protection in place since the 1980s. Commissioner Davante Lewis, D-Baton Rouge, cast the only dissenting vote, warning utilities now have "pretty much a blank check." Entergy stands to earn an estimated $178 million in new annual shareholder profits from the arrangement.
The permit structure reveals a mismatch Louisiana has no tool to close: the authorized ceiling is 23 million gallons per day, and Tsairan's simulation runs at that figure. The 50 wells within a mile of Meta's perimeter sit inside that model, not the 1.5 million gallon daily figure Meta named. Louisiana carries no prior-appropriation curtailment equivalent to the one that stopped 6,400 junior pumpers in Idaho when a 1900 senior right finally enforced.
The ESA points to a cost allocation that the Lightning Amendment's removal of least-cost review made harder to challenge. Louisiana ratepayers now hold an instrument that caps Meta's obligation at year 20 while the gas plants' financing runs to year 30.
Franklin Farms connects to the grid in late 2028. Louisiana DEQ will publish its first annual water withdrawal report for Richland Parish shortly after. If Meta's actual draw trends toward the permitted 23 million gallons per day, Tsairan's simulation was already running the right model.