FERC Opens Its Review of a 13-Mile Gas Lateral Built to Feed Entergy's Plants at Meta's Louisiana Data Center

One million dekatherms a day. That is the capacity ETC Tiger Pipeline wants on a new 13.24-mile lateral in Richland Parish, Louisiana, and the whole of it is contracted to one shipper, Entergy Louisiana, which would burn the gas in generating units built to power Meta’s Hyperion data center ^[1,2]. On Friday, August 28, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s scoping notice for the Franklin Farms Project appeared in the Federal Register, opening the environmental review in Docket CP26-549-000 ^[1].

This is a gas pipeline certificate under Section 7(c) of the Natural Gas Act. The data center does not file in it. It is still the reason the pipe exists.

What ETC Tiger filed, and what FERC started

ETC Tiger, a subsidiary of Energy Transfer, filed its abbreviated application on July 1 ^[2]. The project has two laterals: the 36-inch Franklin Farms Lateral and a 1.75-mile, 20-inch spur called the Trio Farm Lateral ^[1,2]. It adds three delivery meters, each rated up to 320,000 dekatherms a day, named for the Entergy units they serve: combined-cycle units 1 and 2 at Franklin Farms, 3 and 4 at Bee Bayou, and 5 and 6 at Trio Farm ^[2]. Four receipt interconnects would pull gas onto the lateral from Midcontinent Express, Gulf South, Gulf Crossing and Gulf Run ^[1,2]. There is no compression in the project ^[2].

FERC issued the scoping notice on August 25 ^[1]. Construction would disturb about 250 acres, and ETC Tiger would keep about 107 acres for operation ^[1]. Staff will decide after scoping whether to write an environmental assessment or an environmental impact statement ^[1]. ETC Tiger asks for a certificate by April 30, 2027, so it can be in service by February 1, 2028 ^[2].

The lateral versus the mainline

The second number in the application is smaller. Entergy’s contract has two pieces: 1,000,000 dekatherms a day on the new lateral, and 250,000 dekatherms a day of firm mainline capacity from receipt points in Panola County, Texas ^[2]. The lateral’s four interconnects with other pipelines account for the difference; ETC Tiger’s revenue exhibit assumes 250,000 dekatherms a day from its own system, 250,000 from Gulf Run and 500,000 from other pipelines ^[2].

The mainline figure was nearly larger. Entergy held a one-time option, valid until June 30, 2026, to raise its mainline quantity to 500,000 dekatherms a day, and the application says it did not exercise it ^[2]. When the two companies announced the deal in November 2025, Entergy described the lateral as capable of up to 1 Bcf a day and said it had an option to expand delivery capacity ^[5].

What the gas is for, in megawatts

ETC Tiger writes that Entergy, as sole shipper, will use the gas “to supply natural gas to its power generation it is constructing to specifically provide power for the Richland Parish Data Center,” and that the plants will also connect to the grid “to possibly supply power to other customers” ^[2]. It identifies the data center as Meta’s $27 billion Hyperion project ^[2].

The environmental report gives one plant a size. Franklin Farms Power Stations 1 and 2 are two combined-cycle units of 754 MW each, “a total of 1,500 MW,” under construction since December 2025 and expected to run in 2028 ^[2]. That fits Entergy’s August 2025 announcement that the Louisiana Public Service Commission had approved three new combined-cycle plants for Meta, two of them in Richland Parish, due online in late 2028 ^[6].

The other four units are harder to place. In March 2026 Entergy announced a second Meta agreement covering seven more gas-fueled combined-cycle plants, more than 5,200 MW in all ^[7]. The Union of Concerned Scientists reported in April that the Louisiana commission put that application on a fast-track schedule, with a final decision planned for a December 2026 meeting ^[8]. The ETC Tiger filing names Bee Bayou and Trio Farm meters but does not tie those units to either approval, and does not give them a size ^[2].

The data center’s own size depends on which row of the report you read. The Titanium Transmission Line entry describes a “2,640 MW hyperscale data center” ^[2]. The Hyperion entry in the same table says the campus “would total more than 2 gigawatts at full build-out,” with completion anticipated in 2030 ^[2]. Neither number is Meta’s filing.

Who pays for a pipe with one customer?

At FERC, the pipeline’s answer is that Entergy does. The firm transportation agreement runs 20 years at fixed negotiated rates ^[2]. If Entergy does not meet ETC Tiger’s credit standards, it must post support of no more than 18 months of reservation charges, a non-conforming term ETC Tiger asks FERC to approve in this proceeding ^[2]. A second provision lets the agreements terminate if the project goes partly into service but misses an outside date for full service ^[2].

ETC Tiger estimates the cost at $137,388,622 ^[2]. It is not proposing new rates; it asks for rolled-in rate treatment, which would let it fold the facilities into system rates ^[2]. Its Exhibit N shows a first-year cost of service of $20,109,378 against first-year revenue of $28,953,625, an excess of $8,844,247, under an assumption of a 100% load factor ^[2]. On that basis ETC Tiger says the project will have “no financial impact to other existing customers” ^[2]. An open season in October 2025 drew no other requests for capacity ^[2].

At the state level the cost question moves to the electric side. When the commission approved the first plants in 2025, Entergy Louisiana chief executive Phillip May said “Meta is paying its share of the costs for the infrastructure needed to support its operations” ^[6]. Entergy describes its 2026 agreement as structured so that Meta pays its full cost of service, with about $2 billion in projected customer savings over 20 years ^[7]. The Union of Concerned Scientists argues the expedited review leaves Louisiana customers exposed to data-center-driven system costs ^[8]. FERC does not decide that question; the Louisiana commission does.

Where the sides stand

The Sierra Club filed the only protest, on August 6 ^[3,4]. It asks FERC to deny the certificate or at least prepare a full environmental impact statement, citing more than 33 acres of wetland disturbance, more than 41,000 tons of construction greenhouse gases and a nearby census block group that is 64.1 percent minority ^[3]. On need, it argues that “demand associated with a single, newly developing industrial load does not, by itself, establish that the Project is required by the public convenience and necessity” ^[3]. It also wants the review to take in the Franklin Farms plants, the Titanium line, the Smalling Substation and the data center itself, which it calls “causally dependent on and intertwined with” the pipeline ^[3].

ETC Tiger answered on August 20. It asks FERC to deny the Sierra Club’s intervention for failing to identify affected members ^[4]. On need, it relies on FERC policy that precedent agreements are the best evidence: “The fact that Entergy is only a single end-user is not relevant to the Commission’s market need inquiry” ^[4]. It says an environmental assessment is enough and that its resource reports already list the nearby projects in context ^[4].

None of ETC Tiger’s customers or other stakeholders protested, according to the pipeline ^[4]. ETC Tiger says it does not expect to use eminent domain ^[2].

What I’m watching

September 24, 2026. Scoping comments close ^[1]. The question is whether staff picks up the Sierra Club’s request to treat the power plants and data center as part of the review, or keeps to the pipe.

December 2026. The Louisiana commission’s planned decision on Entergy’s seven-unit application ^[8]. It may say what the Bee Bayou and Trio Farm meters are waiting for.