FRANKLIN FURNACE, Oh (WSAZ) -- After 5 years of planning and setbacks, developers say they're back on track to bring a multi-billion dollar steel plant to Southern Ohio.

A plant and spin offs offering at least 25 hundred jobs.

WSAZ.com has covered this story since the Russians were coming and we're still talking about foreign investors.
That's because this is a global economy project. It's been in the works for a long time for Scioto County Ohio.

After much fanfare in 2009, a Russian steel magnate pulled out when the Russian economy tanked.
But with all the air and water permits in order, the effort never stopped
Thursday morning. The key players had a very revealing meeting.

The president of the developing company New Steel International did not say might or could. He said it would break ground.

"We will work with all the people in the room and some of the big utilities to get financing done," John Schultes said. "We will break ground sometime later this year."

The others in the room he referred to, the Ohio Senate president, the local state representative - and Scioto and Lawrence County leaders.

They said the steel plant would not be automotive based like the Russians planned, but new tech environmental.

"Clean coal, wind energy, some of the other advancing energy forms will be driven by new materials that will all come from here," Schultes said. "And, with a strong flavor of defense in it."

It's a plant site outside Franklin Furnace bordered by river and rail that developers said will spawn thousands of jobs.

"If you put the multipliers on spin off jobs it will be a real game changer for the region, Scioto County Commissioner Tom Reiser said. "Will it be 25 hundred plus jobs? Yes."

Developers said the many American steel producers opposed to this foreign driven project really have no grounds for competition concern.

"We are replacing imports with a project like this - so we're not taking any capacity from existing operators," Shultes said.

"I'd rather see American companies come in but anyone who is going to bring jobs to the people of Southern Ohio, I will be supportive of that," Ohio Senate president Tom Niehaus noted.

Senator Niehaus said he and governor Kasich's Jobs Ohio team are in high gear mode on the steel mill project.