Johnson Slams Durbin over Handling of FutureGen Change

Two Republican lawmakers who represent Mattoon are angry about a deadline over the future of that city's role in the FutureGen project.

They include 15th district Congressman Tim Johnson, who says he plans to question the U-S Department of Energy about the government's decision to change the scope of the clean-coal experiment. Democratic Senator Dick Durbin told Mattoon government and economic development officials that they have a week to decide whether to continue their participation - last week Durbin announced that FutureGen would not include a coal-burning power plant in Mattoon, but the site would hold carbon dioxide piped in from existing power plants.

Durbin says federal funding needs to be ironed out soon. But Johnson calls the deadline insulting, saying the original plan was the result of arduous scientific examination. He says selecting another site would ignore the science that went into the selection. State representative Chapin Rose also questions how long Durbin knew of the change in plans before alerting Mattoon officials.