Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions). Your first question comes from Dan Eggers with Credit Suisse.
Dan Eggers - Credit Suisse
I was wondering if you could follow up just on the 2009 guidance towards the lower end. Is that assuming that Georgia gets addressed the way you guys are requesting for the $324 million?
Paul Bowers
That is correct. We are assuming that in our projections.
Dan Eggers - Credit Suisse
If we were to layer that in for the year, would it basically be just a third of that $324 million is what you'd assume to be contributing on a pre-tax profit basis for the year?
Paul Bowers
That's exactly right.
Dan Eggers - Credit Suisse
Obviously, we had some intervener testimony that was not so supportive of that decision process. Can you just give your thoughts on the schedule from here and anything we should be thinking about relative to what the intervener said?
David Ratcliffe
If I am correct, what you're referring to was the initial reaction of the adversary staff that exist in the Georgia regulatory process. It's fairly typical that they would quickly oppose something like this. So we were not surprised at their rather quick response. The matters before the Commission, like I said, we expect to get a ruling by the end of August.
Paul Bowers
I'll add, the process within Georgia you'll go through different administrative committee meetings or sessions that they will review this and determine the process from there.
Dan Eggers - Credit Suisse
You made reference to the notion of your people thinking they might have permanently excess production capacity in the industrial sphere. Should we be reconsidering or rethinking long-term demand growth in your service territory or what the right starting point is if some of these industrial customers apparently aren't coming back again?
Paul Bowers
One of the issues that we are dealing with is economic forecasts for the remaining part of this year. As you'll recall in our plan, we said we would be roughly 2% down year-over-year. Based on our performance thus far this year being 6% down, we're projecting roughly a 5% down on retail sales total for the year.
The issue about capacity, what we're seeing is small non-competitive industrial customers close their doors, but some of these industrial customers are gearing up to expand capacity. So I don't think we make any adjustments in terms of growth. It's just a matter of when demand returns for the products in the marketplace.
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