December 16, 2009 - Right on the heels of the announcement that North Carolina’s Progress Energy will shut down 11 coal plants, and in the face of dozens of coal projects being abandoned nationwide, a Georgia company has announced plans to build yet another coal-fired power plant.
POWER4Georgians, a consortium of Georgia electric cooperatives, has announced plans to build an 850-megawatt pulverized coal-fired power plant near Fitzgerald in Ben Hill County, Georgia. The proposed plant would be located on the Ocmulgee River and would cost about $2 billion.
FITZGERALD, GA (WALB) – A planned Coal burning power Plant in Ben Hill County is drawing big opposition. County officials say the plant will bring much needed jobs to the area.
County has concerns about mercury from the Ben Hill power site. The Brantley County Commission has gone on record opposing plans to build a coal-fired power plant in Ben Hill County. The commissioners aren't worried about the smoke. It's the mercury produced from coal combustion that could settle in the headwaters of the Satilla River and flow downstream through the middle of Brantley County.
Waynesville, Ga. — A private consortium of electric cooperatives, Power4Georgians (P4G), intends to develop a second 850-megawatt coal-fired plant in Georgia, in addition to Plant Washington, north of Sandersville in middle Georgia. Its second plant would be near Fitzgerald in south-central Ben Hill County. Located on the Ocmulgee River, proposed Plant Ben Hill’s coal-burning technology would require enormous water resources in the production of electricity and would emit dangerous pollutants affecting the immediate area as well as downstream and upwind communities.
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