# Strategic Investment "Strategic Investment" is the statutory category that makes a generating resource eligible for cost recovery through the [[Generating Arkansas Jobs Act (GAJA) rider|GAJA Rider]]. It is defined in Ark. Code Ann. § 23-4-1303(10), enacted by Act 373 of 2025 (the Generating Arkansas Jobs Act). The category is the heart of the Ironwood-eligibility dispute that anchors the 26-008-TF docket. ## How it appears in the corpus ### The statutory definition Per the enrolled-bill text of Act 373 of 2025 (primary public record, [Act 373 of 2025 archive](../../web%20archive/2026-05-24/arkleg.state.ar.us/act-373-of-2025.md), 2026-05-24), § 23-4-1303(10)(A) provides: > "Strategic Investments" means investments, either construction or purchase, and associated operating expenses made by a [an] electric public utility or natural gas public utility, **and approved by the Arkansas Public Service Commission under § 23-3-201 et seq., the Utility Facility Environmental and Economic Protection Act, § 23-18-501 et seq., or a notice under § 23-18-104 or as otherwise stated in subdivision (10)(B) of this section**, to: > (i) Support growth and economic development in this state, including supporting the development of sites designated as available for economic development; > (ii) Maintain and improve the provision of reliable electric utility service and natural gas utility service to new and existing customers in this state; > (iii) Support the license extension for existing nuclear generation resources; and > (iv) Ensure that electric utilities maintain adequate dispatchable generation resources to support reliable service for their customers that is consistent with the resource adequacy requirements established by the applicable load balancing authority. **Chapeau structure** (load-bearing for [[T002 - Ironwood Strategic Investment Designation Requirement|T002]] / [[D002 Synthesis]]): Strategic Investments require **(a) APSC approval** under one of four enumerated approval pathways — § 23-3-201 et seq. (CECPN); UFEEPA § 23-18-501 et seq.; § 23-18-104 notice; or per se inclusion via (10)(B) — and **(b) the approval must be for one of four enumerated purposes** (economic development; reliability; nuclear license extension; dispatchable generation adequacy). The two requirements are conjunctive. Palmer's rebuttal testimony in [[Palmer Rebuttal on Ironwood]] quotes the (10)(A) text but is silent on the chapeau's approval-pathway-plus-purpose conjunction. The dialectic surfaced this issue from Palmer's own primary source. And § 23-4-1303(10)(B)(i) — the per se inclusion clause: > "'Strategic investments' includes without limitation investments and associated operating expenses associated with: (i) A new electric generating facility, an associated transportation and storage facility for fuel, and other facilities designed for or capable of operation at a capacity of one hundred megawatts (100 MW) or more for a single facility." ### The § 23-4-1304(w) transition provision (verbatim, 2026-05-24) Per the same primary public record ([Act 373 of 2025 archive](../../web%20archive/2026-05-24/arkleg.state.ar.us/act-373-of-2025.md)), § 23-4-1304(w): > An expenditure associated with strategic investments for which an application for approval is pending before the commission as of the effective date of this subchapter shall be eligible for recovery through the rider under this subchapter if: > (1) The costs are not otherwise included in rates approved by the commission before the effective date of this subchapter; > (2) The investor-owned electric utility or the investor-owned natural gas utility has an application pending that was filed before the effective date of this subchapter for approval: (A) To construct a power generation facility outside of the state under § 23-18-104; (B) To obtain a certificate of environmental compatibility and public need under [UFEEPA], § 23-18-501 et seq.; (C) To obtain a certificate of public convenience and necessity under § 23-3-201 et seq.; or (D) For any other application related to the siting or prudence of the decision to invest in the new strategic investments; **and** > (3) The commission enters an order **after January 1, 2025**, approving an application that was filed before the effective date of this subchapter for approval: [same four categories (A)-(D) as in (2)]. **(w) is a three-condition test for recovery eligibility — not a designation waiver.** All three conditions (1)+(2)+(3) must be met. The (w) provision presumes the resource IS a Strategic Investment under § 23-4-1303(10); it does not on its own confer Strategic Investment status on a resource that does not otherwise meet (10)(A) or (10)(B). ### The contested question — tracked as [[T002 - Ironwood Strategic Investment Designation Requirement|T002]] Whether a separate Commission *finding* that a particular resource is a Strategic Investment is required for inclusion in the GAJA Rider, or whether meeting the statutory definition + a utility notice of election is sufficient. This is the core T002 tension and has been twice-dialecticized ([[D002 Synthesis]] and [[D004 Synthesis]], both 2026-05-24). The corpus has two opposing positions: - [[APSC Staff Testimony on the GAJA Rider|APSC General Staff (Mark Herring)]]: a specific Commission finding is required; absent that finding, [[Ironwood]] should be excluded from the rider (cutting recovery by ~$33.9M of the $110.4M). - [[Palmer Rebuttal on Ironwood|Entergy Arkansas (J. David Palmer)]]: § 23-4-1304(f)(1) provides that "**At the election of the investor-owned electric utility... strategic investments shall be recovered through the rider**" — utility election is the operative act. For pre-Act 373 resources like [[Ironwood]], § 23-4-1304(w) provides eligibility without an additional finding. **Dialectical record on T002:** - [[D002 Synthesis]] (2026-05-24): bracketed pending (w) text + Commission ruling. Antithesis pulled the (10)(A) chapeau's "approved by the Commission" requirement from Palmer's own primary source ([[Palmer Rebuttal on Ironwood]] p. 4); surfaced the dedicated Strategic Investment Findings sections in [[Cypress Order No. 4 CECPN Approval]] and [[Jefferson Order No. 5 SREA Limited Intervention]] that no Ironwood order matches. - [[D004 Synthesis]] (2026-05-24, follow-on with now-complete corpus including the Act 373 enrolled bill and Order No. 9): bracket preserved with refined reason — the live disagreement narrowed to a question of *minimum content* (what must an order contain to count as a designation?) rather than *categorical exclusion*. [[Cypress Order No. 4 CECPN Approval]] demonstrates designation **can** ride inside a CECPN order; the question is whether Order No. 9's silence on the framework is dispositive. Status now `bracketed-because-Commission-ruling-pending` — corpus complete; question committed to the Commission's interpretive judgment. The dispute has not been resolved by the Commission as of 2026-05-12 ([[Order No. 6 Legislative Council Report|Order No. 6]] is procedural). See [[T002 - Ironwood Strategic Investment Designation Requirement]] for the full tension record. ### The three resources at issue Each of these is in the [[Generating Arkansas Jobs Act (GAJA) rider|GAJA Rider]]'s 2026 Annual Update: - [[Ironwood]] — gas combustion turbine; CECPN [[Ironwood|24-072-U]]; CECPN application filed 2024-11-01 (pre-Act 373). **Disputed.** - [[Jefferson Power Station]] — natural gas; CECPN 25-047-U; application filed *after* Act 373. Not disputed in this docket. - [[Arkansas Cypress]] — solar + battery; CECPN 25-054-U; application filed *after* Act 373. Not disputed. ## Stakeholders [[Entergy Arkansas]] (utility electing recovery); [[Arkansas Public Service Commission]] (decisional authority); [[APSC General Staff]] (contests inclusion); [[Office of the Arkansas Attorney General]] (contests cost-of-debt, not the strategic-investment designation); all retail customers (pay). ## Timeline - **2025-03-20** — Act 373 of 2025 (the Generating Arkansas Jobs Act) signed. - **2024-11-01** — Ironwood's CECPN application filed in [[Ironwood|24-072-U]], pre-dating Act 373. - **2025-09-23** — Entergy files Notice of Intent to Include Ironwood in GAJA Rider in 24-072-U (per Palmer Rebuttal). - **2025-09-24** — Commission directs EAL to provide Ironwood bill impacts in [[Generating Arkansas Jobs Act (GAJA) rider|Docket 25-049-TF]] Order No. 4 (per Palmer Rebuttal). ## Notes The legal interpretation of "Strategic Investment" determines who pays for the cost of new generation: if Ironwood is excluded, the rider's revenue requirement drops by $33.9M and Entergy bears that cost on its own balance sheet until a later proceeding; if it's included, all 738,836 retail customers pay. The definitional clause § 23-4-1303(10)(A)(i) — "Support growth and economic development in this state, including supporting the development of sites designated as available for economic development" — is the **only place** in the statute that references economic-development sites. This is the doctrinal hook a future synthesis could use to ask whether the strategic-investment classification is implicitly tied to data-center / hyperscale demand growth, even where no data-center customer is named in the rider as a driver.