Nonprofits sue Louisiana Public Service Commission over “Lightning Directive”

BATON ROUGE, La. (KALB) — Three Louisiana nonprofits filed a lawsuit Monday challenging the Louisiana Public Service Commission’s adoption of a procedural rule called the “Lightning Directive.”

What the directive does

The plaintiffs say the directive allows utilities such as Entergy to skip certain standard procedural steps designed to protect ratepayers from paying unnecessary costs before the commission approves new projects.

The directive is being used to facilitate construction of two hyperscale data center projects: Applied Digital’s Delta Forge 1 and Meta’s Hyperion.

Entergy plans to use the directive in December to seek commission approvals related to the Meta data center proposed for Richland Parish.

Notice allegations

The commission passed the directive in December 2025. The nonprofits say the Louisiana Constitution requires the commission to give the public advance notice of changes to its rules or procedures. They allege the commission did not provide any advance indication of which rules or procedures it would change when it adopted the directive.

The lawsuit says the only record that the rule exists is in the commission’s December meeting minutes. It says the directive does not appear among the commission’s General Rules and Regulations, Rules of Practice and Procedure, Amendments or Special Orders. The plaintiffs say this supports their concerns about a lack of transparency.

Plaintiffs

The plaintiffs are the Louisiana Landowners Coalition, Louisiana Citizen Advocacy Group and Save My Louisiana, Inc. The groups are made up of landowners and community advocates who are affected by the commission’s decisions.

Dustin McAnn of the Louisiana Landowners Coalition is a cattle farmer and teacher in LaSalle Parish. His land could be seized by Entergy to service the Meta data center.

“Democracy only works when the government plays by the rules. The Public Service Commission does not get a free pass for violating the Constitution,” attorney William Most said.

“Our Coalition members are facing forced expropriation, permanent loss of value, and damage to their family farms, private homesteads, and wildlife habitats under a process cooked up behind closed doors,” McAnn said. “The Public Service Commission owes Louisiana landowners transparency and constitutional fairness, not secret shortcuts that benefit a multi-billion-dollar utility at the expense of everyday Louisianians.”

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