ANALYSIS

A 3 to 1 vote on August 12 overruled the commission's own judge, who had found Meta's job and power projections relevant to whether Entergy's expansion is in the public interest. The same five-member board rules on that expansion in December.

By Kim M. Braud | August 14, 2026

The Louisiana Public Service Commission voted 3 to 1 on August 12 to quash a subpoena that would have required Meta to show how it calculated the job and electricity figures behind its Hyperion data center in Richland Parish. The subpoena had been granted by the commission's own administrative law judge.

The three Republican commissioners, Jean-Paul Coussan, Mike Francis and chairman Eric Skrmetta, voted to overturn the judge. Davante Lewis, a Democrat, cast the only vote to keep the subpoena in place. The commission's second Democrat, Foster Campbell, was absent, which is why the tally was 3 to 1 rather than 3 to 2.

The request came from the Alliance for Affordable Energy and the Union of Concerned Scientists, which filed their motion on June 29 in docket U-37882. They asked for the records substantiating Meta's projected permanent jobs and its projected power demand, the same figures Entergy has used in its filings without independently verifying them. Administrative Law Judge Melanie Verzwyvelt granted the subpoena, finding the information relevant to whether Entergy's proposal serves the public interest.

The docket the vote sits inside

The vote did not resolve the underlying case. It removed a piece of evidence from it. Docket U-37882 is Entergy Louisiana's application to certify new generation and transmission to serve Meta's expansion at Hyperion, a buildout multiple outlets have put at more than 5,200 megawatts of new generation and roughly 13 billion dollars in new power plants. The commission is scheduled to decide that application at its December 2026 Business and Executive Session. Meta is a party to the proceeding.

That expansion is separate from the infrastructure the commission has already approved. Entergy has said the commission signed off on its plan to build three combined cycle turbine facilities, two in Richland Parish and one at the Waterford site in St. Charles Parish, to serve the first phase of the project.

What the commission decided it does not need to know

The commission will judge whether the buildout is in the public interest in December. In August, it decided it did not need to see the numbers its own judge called relevant.

Coussan, who has not signed a nondisclosure agreement with Meta, argued that general figures on jobs and power are already public and that the more detailed data Meta treats as proprietary is not the commission's concern. He also warned that letting an outside party subpoena a company not directly before the commission would discourage investment in the state.

Lewis argued the opposite, that ratepayers carry the risk if Meta's commitments end before the power plants Entergy builds for it reach the end of their service lives.

The distinction is not academic. The commission's task in December is a public-interest finding. The figures the subpoena sought were not ruled irrelevant. The commission's own judge found them relevant. The commission ruled that relevance was not enough to compel their production.

That is the tension the December vote will carry. A regulator required to decide whether an expansion serves the public interest has decided, in advance, that it does not need the company's own basis for the numbers that expansion rests on.

The questions around the record

The vote lands amid separate questions about how independent the commission's record is. The Gulf States Newsroom reported this month that motions several commissioners adopted as their own in Meta and Hyundai proceedings were drafted by a senior Entergy Louisiana executive, based on metadata in the original files. Evans Cutchmore has not independently reviewed those files.

On the nondisclosure agreements, the record is narrower than it is sometimes described. None of the five commissioners signed an NDA with Meta. The commission's executive secretary, Brandon Frey, signed one through Louisiana Economic Development, and the agreement names the commission as a party. State officials including Governor Jeff Landry signed NDAs tied to the deal.

None of that context was before the commission as a reason to compel the records. It is the backdrop against which the December public-interest finding will be read. The narrower question the August vote answers is procedural and specific: whether a regulator can certify a project as serving the public interest on figures it has agreed it does not need to independently see.

How to follow this

The body that decides docket U-37882 is the five-member Louisiana Public Service Commission.

The certification is scheduled for the commission's December 2026 Business and Executive Session.

The record lives in docket U-37882 on the LPSC document portal, including the subpoena motion, Judge Verzwyvelt's ruling, and the commission order.

The commissioners and their districts: Skrmetta (District 1), Coussan (District 2), Lewis (District 3), Francis (District 4), Campbell (District 5). Contacts are posted at lpsc.louisiana.gov.

Kim M. Braud is the Founder & Editor of Evans Cutchmore Press, an independent newsroom covering Louisiana and the Gulf South. Her reporting focuses on government accountability, infrastructure, business, culture, and the public policies that shape communities. Her work combines investigative journalism, public records research, and documentary storytelling.

© 2026 Evans Cutchmore Press. All rights reserved.