You are all overlooking the fact that this is a REGULATED UTILITY building the plant. The Public Service Commission determines how much of the costs incurred are allowed into the “rate base,” i.e., how much the owner is allowed to charge to the end customers. If a utility cannot charge its customers for the costs, the shareholders must pay. You can imagine how the shareholders frown on that.
This is what prevents the utility from paying higher, more competitive labor rates. It is a classic problem in a healthy, growing economy, with lots of demand for skilled labor. The regulators are always way behind the competitive sector in adjusting allowed costs — the adjustments occur in “rate cases” where the commission passes judgement on which costs are allowed to go into the rate base. Rate cases are discrete events that do not happen very often.
I’ll defer to your knowledge of the hiring particulars; when they want it enough, they’ll magically find the money.