President Donald Trump is doling out nearly $700 million in taxpayer money in his most aggressive attempt yet to revitalize the country’s declining and heavily polluting coal-power industry.
Trump will devote nearly $200 million toward building two new coal units in Alaska and West Virginia — a herculean undertaking for an industry that had all but given up on any future construction plans in the United States. The last new coal plant came online to the U.S. power grid in 2013.
The rest of the money would be given as grants to 13 existing coal-fired power plants and to build a new coal export terminal.
These investments are in addition to the more than $600 million the Department of Energy rerouted last year away from clean energy programs and toward coal plant upgrades instead.
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Trump said Thursday that the money for the two new coal plants would also be repurposed from clean-energy funding.
“It was set aside for the ‘Green New Scam,’ but the ‘Green New Scam’ is history,” he said.
Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to justify spending federal dollars on the effort, doubling down on the idea that the nation’s power grid is in a crisis that requires government intervention. His administration has taken extraordinary steps to intervene in the industry, repeatedly shocking free-market absolutists, power grid experts and renewable energy advocates alike.
Before Trump took office, domestic coal power plants were shutting down at an increasingly rapid pace and coal consumption had been on a steady decline. Coal is a significantly more expensive source of energy than natural gas and renewables, and competition from both has helped to drive the downturn.
“Pouring taxpayer dollars into dirty, unreliable coal plants that bleed money is a surefire way to drive up families’ electricity bills even higher,” said Ted Kelly of the Environmental Defense Fund. “Utilities are retiring coal plants for a reason — to save money. At a time when we need more power on the grid, doubling down on one of the most expensive, polluting energy sources is the worst possible answer.”
Coal is also far dirtier than the other more commonly used energy sources, contributing significantly to smog, particulate matter in the air and greenhouse gas emissions.
Before Thursday’s announcement, the Trump administration had made several unusual moves to try to save the industry.
The Energy Department used its authority to keep coal plants across the country from following through with their planned retirements, forcing them to stay operating regardless of whether the companies running them and the communities relying on them wanted that intervention.
In one case, Colorado utility companies argued that the Energy Department was violating their constitutional rights by forcing them to keep the plants open, NOTUS previously reported. The Energy Department has justified its moves by arguing that the power grid needs these plants to be operational. But some of the plants have remained online for months — costing ratepayers to keep them that way — without ever being called upon to supply power.
Trump has also directed the Defense Department to purchase electricity specifically from coal-fired power plants.
“America’s Power appreciates the Trump administration’s ongoing support for coal,” Michelle Bloodworth, the CEO of coal industry alliance America’s Power, said in a press release.
“From the National Energy Emergency declaration and executive action directing power purchase agreements for coal plants at military installations, to regulatory relief for coal-fired generators and reestablishment of the National Coal Council, this administration has taken meaningful steps to support coal-based electricity and the reliable power it provides for our country,” Bloodworth said.
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