Entergy

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The “rate settlement” reflects rate reductions that were achievable because the customer base grew faster than estimates expected following Hurricane Katrina and the fact that the company focused on efficient business management while improving reliability throughout the city and continuing the rebuild of the underground gas system.

The electric rate reduction will mean a decrease on an average of 4 percent on the total electric bill for Entergy New Orleans residential customers. A typical electric customer using 1,000 kWh will experience a decrease of approximately $3.82 per month.

Other key components of the settlement include:

• Funding for Energy Smart, a collaborative initiative aimed at providing needed energy efficiency measures to our citizens
• Gas hedging to take advantage of low gas prices to create stability of summer power generation costs
• A future long-term power generation resource from a more efficient power plant to meet future needs
• More customer friendly and clarity of billing components through a new bill redesign

Entergy New Orleans also agreed to facilitate a funding mechanism for the Energy Smart program. The intent of that effort is to make homes in the city more energy efficient and to create “green” jobs.

For gas customers, the City Council and Entergy agreed to a $4.9 million gas base rate increase which means Entergy's combination gas and electric customers will experience a net $30 million rate decrease. The new rates will allow the company to meet its cost of providing safe and reliable gas service citywide while maintaining a gas system that has about 60 percent of its pre-Katrina customers.

Changes to customer bills are not expected to take effect until the first billing of June 2009.