In Lansing's case as he mentioned the power is already being generated and sold to other utilities. If it powered local data centers instead it would generate high paying jobs and rather large tax revenues.
I'd love to import a couple of high paid weirdos from out of town to build a data center for a year and then jet off to some other poor community to do it all over again. At least a couple of the locals can work as janitors and night security at the empty, shrieking warehouse that they erect.
Travis makes a strong argument that the city that birthed Oldsmobile and REO Motors would probably reject those companies today if they wanted to build there.
"Greenhouse gas"