Houma upgrading Entergy lines?

At its meeting next Wednesday, the Terrebonne Parish Council will consider setting aside $5 million from the parish’s Five-Year Capital Outlay budget to pay for upgrades to Entergy’s transmission lines coming into Houma.

The upgrades will permit Entergy to install Network Integrated Transmission Service (NITS), an improved electricity transmission capability allowing the City of Houma Electric Utility System to use less of its own generating power.

“The improvements would increase our import capability,” said Terrebonne Parish Utilities Director Tom Bourg.

Houma currently produces 15 to 25 percent of its own electricity from three generators. The city buys 40 percent of its electricity from a coal-burning power-generating plant located in Boyce, near Alexandria, over lines owned by Entergy and Cleco.

After receiving the power, the system distributes electricity to customers on lines owned by Houma.

In 2006, the Louisiana Energy and Power Authority (LEPA, the state agency based in Lafayette overseeing Louisiana’s city-run electrical power systems) asked Entergy and Cleco to install NITS to serve Houma and Morgan City. The subsequent agreement states that the two cities would pay the Authority for the upgrades necessary for Entergy to put the new transmission service in place.

“The requesting agency (LEPA) can accept what it takes to improve (service) or withdraw the request,” said Bourg, who is also vice-chairman of LEPA’s board of directors.

He said the actual cost of the upgrades to the parish would probably be around $3.6 million.

The parish and Entergy have been engaged in a lengthy dispute over which party must pay for the upgrades.

Bourg said Terrebonne may not have to pay for the improvements if they are designated “general system improvements.”

If the upgrades are classified as supplemental, the parish would have to pay.

Additionally, Terrebonne has been seeking to sell the City of Houma Electric Utility System. In April 2007, Bourg sent Entergy a packet detailing the assets of the city power system, which is valued at $26,322,835 and serves 26,185 customers.

Bourg said, although the Houma power system is on the market, the parish Department of Utilities has to go on with business.

“While we are mindful of the expense of exploring the sale,” he said, “it’s impossible for us to stop dead in the water for a number of years and not carry on with the most prudent needs of our system.”

He said also that the upgrades are necessary to serve the Houma system’s customers regardless of who owns the system.

At the council’s Budget and Finance Committee meeting Feb. 11, the committee authorized Parish President Michel Claudet to sign an agreement funding the Terrebonne Economic Development Authority for three more years beginning Feb.1.

TEDA is the parish’s main government agency responsible for attracting new business to Terrebonne.

The agreement ensures that TEDA will continue to receive 50 percent of the parish’s occupational license tax to fund operations. The other half of the tax goes into the parish’s general fund.

The agreement requires an annual audit of TEDA by an independent Certified Public Accountant and the approval of TEDA’s budget by the parish council.

Additionally, the agreement directs parish officials to petition the Louisiana Legislature at the 2008 Regular Session for a change in the state Act governing TEDA.

For each board position, the parish delegation must request the Legislature to lower from six to three the number of candidates required to be submitted for evaluation to the parish council by South Central Industrial Association and Houma-Terrebonne’s chamber.