Beloit College Continues Raising Funds For Conversion Of Power Plant Into Student Center

Beloit College says it’s well on its way to raising enough money to turn a former power plant into a student union and recreation center.

The school is trying to raise $38 million to gut the former Alliant Energy plant in downtown Beloit and repurpose it into a student space. The college’s secretary and chief of staff, Dan Schoof, said careful attention would be paid to environmental clean-ups at the former plant, which for a long time ran on coal, and then later natural gas.

“We’ve gone a long way to make sure that any sort of exposure to the stuff that was left behind, that will all be removed or sealed up,” said Schoof.

Two former power plants in downtown Milwaukee have been similarly converted for other uses in the past 30 years. There are also more conversions taking place around the U.S. as the growth of alternative energy and other changes put more coal-fired plants out of business.