Will Trump Make This $7 Billion Clean-Coal Plant Irrelevant?
- After $2.6 billion writedown, Southern Co. will open facility
- Cost overruns and two years of postponements plagued project
Trump's Mysterious Feelings on Global Warming
Southern Co.’s “clean-coal” plant has been hailed as a first-of-its-kind project. President Donald Trump’s climate-change skepticism could make it the last.
The facility in Kemper County, Mississippi, is slated to finally start generating electricity and capturing carbon dioxide from coal by Jan. 31. The plant has been plagued by construction challenges, running more than two years behind schedule with a $7 billion price tag that’s more than double its original $2.88 billion budget. Southern has had to write down about $2.6 billion before taxes for Kemper, and faces lawsuits it says are baseless. Now the challenge is a new administration that supports coal but promises to roll back environmental and energy regulations.