Overview
- Developers held public outreach events that explained a four‑phase plan to build 1,500 megawatts of on‑site power for a large industrial customer and answered technical questions at station-style open houses.
- Opponents have mobilized at public gatherings and civic events to protest the project’s scale and possible health, traffic and logging impacts, with residents raising concerns about air quality and heavy truck traffic for biomass supply.
- Project River’s plan calls for 1,000 MW from natural gas and 500 MW from woody biomass, and developers said they would request a 360‑MW TVA interconnection reserved for backup and peak use rather than as the campus’s main power source.
- Developers say the campus would avoid using municipal water for daily operations by recovering and reusing water from the biomass process, and they estimate roughly 900 direct campus jobs plus about 1,700 forestry‑related positions.
- The proposal remains contingent on annexation and land‑use approvals from city and county bodies and the public review process, and city officials say formal planning and community meetings will precede any annexation vote.