Last week, President Trump issued executive orders designed Reviving coal use in power plantsAnd it is a practice that has decreased steadily for more than a decade.
Energy experts said this effort is likely to fail, because fossil fuels face some critical obstacles. The energy produced by coal plants usually cannot compete with cheaper and cleaner alternatives. Many plants that burn charcoal are very old and will need wide and expensive promotions to continue running.
“It will be very difficult to reverse this trend,” said Dan Raycher, Assistant Energy Minister of the Clinton Administration and former Google Climate and Energy Manager. “There is a variety of powers at work that does not draw a very bright future for charcoal.”
Why the use of coal decreased?
Once the main source of electricity in the United States, coal factories now produce only 17 percent of the power of the country. The main reason is that natural gas, another fossil fuel, has become abundant and cheap due to the rock crack mutation that started in the early first decade of the twentieth century. The use of renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar energy, also grew a lot.
Natural gas now provides about 38 percent of US electricity, according to the Energy Information Department. Renewable energy techniques such as solar energy, wind and hydroelectric energy produce about 25 percent, and nuclear energy generates about 20 percent.
Some areas, such as New EnglandThe last coal power plants are to be closed soon. The country’s most populated country, California, does not use almost coal for electricity generation.
Coal was also under pressure because burning it released greenhouse gases responsible for climate change and pollutants that harm people and nature. Mr. Trump said that circumventing these concerns He will give up some of the restrictions imposed on the air For dozens of charcoal plants.
Where is the coal used?
In the southeast and west, many facilities continue to generate electricity from coal factories. Companies such as Alabama Power, Georgia Power, Duke Energy and The Tennesse Valley-the largest energy provider in the country-are among the largest coal users.
Countries with a long history of coal mining are still highly dependent on fuel. It includes Western Virginia, which received 85 percent of electricity from coal last year, and Kentucky, which received 67 percent, according to the Energy Information Department.
Mr. Trump directed the Energy Department To use emergency powers To maintain unprecedented charcoal stations. The president said this is necessary to prevent power outage. he I tried a similar strategy During his first term.
It has also been released Orders to cancel any regulations “Discrimination” against coal production, opening new federal lands to extract coal and exploring whether the energy generation plants that burn coal can serve the data centers used in artificial intelligence services such as Chatbots.
Pepodi, the largest coal producer in the United States, said that the world used more coal in 2024 more than any other year in history, the fact that this is what highlighted the need to support energy requirements.
“To support the increasing needs of our country for reasonable and reliable energy, we believe that the United States should stop the retirement of the charcoal factory, and the use of plants in the use of closed closed coal factories,” said Vic Sfick, a Pepodi spokesman.
Can the Trump administration revive coal?
While federal policies can play a role, facilities, legislators and organizers in the state who ultimately supervise them determining the amount of burning charcoal in power plants.
The Edison Electricity Institute, or EEI, a commercial association for facilities, said in a statement that it had agreed with the administration that the United States needs more electricity sources, but it refused to talk about or against the use of coal.
The institute said: “The demand for electricity grows at the fastest pace in decades, and EEI electricity companies use a diversified, locally and balanced mixture to meet this demand while maintaining customer bills as low as possible.”
Some large facilities, such as Xcel Energy, convert coal factories to solar farms, partly to take advantage of the federal incentives created during the Biden administration. For example, in Baker, Minnesot Sherco Coal Station. The company converts another Coal plant, in Colorado, For natural gas.
The XCEL spokesman Theo Keith said that the tool was declining the orders of Mr. Trump “to understand whether they could affect our operations,” but in the meantime, it will provide clean energy at a low cost to consumers.
Conservative lawmakers in some states, such as Texas, have suggested legislation to require greater use of fossil fuel to ensure adequate energy supplies and meet the increasing demand from data centers, electric cars and heat pumps. But the power analysts expect this, if passed, such measures will benefit natural gas in the first place, not coal.
Environmental activists said that the efforts to revive coal was misleading. They point out that countries that use more coal tend to get higher electricity bills, more health problems and greater risks than the power plant failure due to the isolation of equipment.
“We are really reflecting work contracts here really,” said Holly Bandar, chief program official at Sierra Club, who managed a campaign called “Beyond that Coal” to end the use of this fuel. “It is clear that Trump is trying to put his finger on the scale to keep the charcoal open. But these are pieces of infrastructure that are at the end of its productive life.”
