It sounds like a bandaid to paper over a poorly-conceived program of incentives while they work out something more permanent. They were using their power plant

It sounds like a bandaid to paper over a poorly-conceived program of incentives while they work out something more permanent. They were using their power plant as a loss-leader to attract industry. Which explains why the local factory is "more allowed;" it's presumably because they expect the factory to generate more jobs and tax revenue than the bitcoin miner.