On April 8, 2025, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order (EO) 14261: Reinvigorating America’s Beautiful Clean Coal Industry and Amending Executive Order 14241 and issued a Presidential Proclamation entitled “Regulatory Relief for Certain Stationary Sources to Promote American Energy.” These actions gave almost 70 coal-fired power plants a two-year exemption from meeting tighter emissions laws finalized during the Biden administration.
The administration cites a growing demand for power generation due to data centers, artificial intelligence (AI), and infrastructure to support electric vehicles.
Background
On April 25, 2024, the Biden administration announced a suite of final rules to reduce pollution from fossil fuel-fired power plants, which included:
- A final rule for existing coal-fired and new natural gas-fired power plants that would ensure all coal-fired plants that plan to run in the long term and all new baseload gas-fired plants control 90% of their carbon pollution;
- A final rule strengthening and updating the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) for coal-fired power plants, tightening the emissions standard for toxic metals by 67% and finalizing a 70% reduction in the emissions standard for mercury from existing lignite-fired sources;
- A final rule to reduce pollutants discharged through wastewater from coal-fired power plants by more than 660 million pounds per year, ensuring cleaner water for affected communities, including communities with environmental justice concerns that are disproportionately impacted; and
- A final rule that would require the safe management of coal ash that’s placed in areas that were unregulated at the federal level until now, including at previously used disposal areas that may leak and contaminate groundwater.
This rule’s effective date was July 8, 2024, and the timeline for compliance was set for three years, with the option for a one-year extension.
EO 14261: Reinvigorating America’s Beautiful Clean Coal Industry and Amending Executive Order 14241
“In order to secure America’s economic prosperity and national security, lower the cost of living, and provide for increases in electrical demand from emerging technologies, we must increase domestic energy production, including coal. Coal is abundant and cost effective, and can be used in any weather condition. … It is a national priority to support the domestic coal industry by removing Federal regulatory barriers that undermine coal production, encouraging the utilization of coal to meet growing domestic energy demands, increasing American coal exports, and ensuring that Federal policy does not discriminate against coal production or coal-fired electricity generation,” the EO states.
The EO:
- Designates coal as a “mineral,” which means it’s entitled to the benefits of minerals as defined in EO 14241;
- Orders the secretaries of the Interior, Agriculture, and Energy to prepare and submit a joint report that identifies coal reserves on federal lands, identifies any issues with mining these resources, and proposes policies to address any identified issues to enable the mining of these resources;
- Prioritizes coal leasing activities;
- Orders the head of the EPA and the heads of the departments of Transportation, Energy, Labor, and the Treasury to identify any guidance, regulations, or policies that seek to transition the nation away from coal production and energy generation within 30 days;
- Requires the heads of these departments and agencies to consider revising or rescinding any applicable regulations, policies, or guidance within 60 days;
- Removes barriers to federal loans or financial assistance for investments in coal production or coal-fired electricity generation;
- Orders the secretary of Energy to determine whether coal used in the production of steel meets the definition of a “critical material” under the Energy Act of 2020;
- Orders the secretary of the Interior to determine whether metallurgical coal used in the production of steel meets the criteria to be designated as a “critical mineral” under the Energy Act of 2020;
- Orders the secretaries of Energy, Interior, and Commerce to identify regions where coal-powered infrastructure is available to support AI data centers within 60 days; and
- Requires the secretary of Energy to take all necessary actions, consistent with applicable law, to accelerate the development, deployment, and commercialization of coal technologies.
“After Trump signed the orders, [Energy Secretary Chris] Wright’s department made $200 billion in financing available for its loan programs office including for new coal technologies,” Reuters reports. “Under previous presidents, the loans have only rarely been used for carbon capture at coal plants.”
Presidential Proclamation: Regulatory Relief for Certain Stationary Sources to Promote American Energy
This proclamation directly impacts the MATS rule and states the rule places severe burdens on coal-fired power plants, specifically that it “requires compliance with standards premised on the application of emissions-control technologies that do not yet exist in a commercially viable form.”
Due to the perceived lack of required emissions control technology, the proclamation exempts stationary sources from compliance for two years beyond the rule’s compliance date of July 8, 2027.
Declining demand for coal
“Coal’s share of U.S. power generation has fallen below 20% in recent years, after supplying about half of the nation’s electricity in 2000, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). Natural gas has taken much of coal’s market share over the past two decades, as hydraulic fracturing and other drilling techniques have markedly increased production of the fuel. Natural gas in recent years has accounted for nearly half of U.S. power generation during the summer months,” according to POWER magazine. “The growth of renewable energy, including solar and wind power, also has taken market share from coal. Renewables account for more than 20% of U.S. power generation, according to EIA.”
Due to this decline, employment in the coal industry has shrunk from 70,000 to 40,000, the Reuters article says.
Michelle Bloodworth, president and CEO of America’s Power, which lobbies for coal-fired energy, notes that “Trump recognizes that the U.S. coal-fired power plant fleet is ‘essential to maintaining a healthy and secure electricity supply—the backbone of our economy,’” POWER adds. “Bloodworth said rules enacted by the Biden administration ‘were inconsistent with the Clean Air Act (CAA) and based on an improper analysis of data.’
“Bloodworth, who has previously been critical of regulations on power plant emissions, said the mercury rule, which was finalized last year, could have contributed to the retirement of dozens of coal-fired power units. Bloodworth and other supporters of the coal industry have argued that coal-fired units are critical to provide needed electricity and support reliability of the power grid. Utilities and energy industry analysts have told POWER that economics have been mostly responsible for coal plant retirements, as natural gas and renewable energy have proven more efficient and less costly than coal for power generation.”
Because several coal-fired plants were already slated for retirement, POWER notes, many have stated the exemptions won’t alter retirement plans for these plants.
Coal as a mineral
“U.S. electricity demand is rising for the first time in two decades on growth in power-hungry data centers for artificial intelligence, electric vehicles, and cryptocurrencies,” Reuters continues. “The orders … direct Energy Secretary Chris Wright to determine whether coal used in steel production is a ‘critical mineral.’ Allowing that classification, typically reserved for minerals needed for high-tech defense systems, for metallurgical coal could set the table for use of emergency powers to raise production.”
EO 14261 orders the designation of coal as a “mineral” as defined in Section 2 of EO 14241, thereby entitling coal to all the benefits of a “mineral” under that order.
Section 2 of EO 14241 describes a mineral as “a critical mineral, as defined by 30 U.S.C. 1606(a)(3), as well as uranium, copper, potash, gold, and any other element, compound or material as determined by the Chair of the National Energy Dominance Council (NEDC).”
30 U.S.C. 1606(a)(3) defines a “critical mineral” as any mineral, element, substance, or material designated as critical by the secretary acting through the director of the U.S. Geological Survey.
However, Section 1606(a)(3) also lists exclusions to the term “critical mineral,” which includes “fuel minerals.”
Coal isn’t scientifically classified as a mineral because it’s formed from the remains of organic matter. Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines a mineral as “a solid chemical element or compound (as diamond or quartz) that occurs naturally in the form of crystals and results from inorganic processes.”
Considering the plain-language definitions of “minerals” and “critical minerals” from both the dictionary and the U.S. Code, redefining coal as a mineral will certainly be problematic when challenged in court.
Available technology
In his proclamation, Trump states compliance with the MATS rule is “premised on the application of emissions-control technologies that do not yet exist in a commercially viable form.”
However, many emissions control technologies are readily available. These include:
- Carbon capture utilization and storage (CCS)
- Flue gas desulfurization (FGD)
- Selective catalytic reduction (SCR)
- Low-nitrogen oxide (NOx) burners
- Baghouses
- Activated carbon injection (ACI)
Many states have been granted primacy in Class VI well permits, and there’s ample available EPA data that reveals the abundance of planned CCS projects, as well as the demand for this technology.
Clean coal
“I call it beautiful, clean coal. I told my people, never use the word coal unless you put beautiful, clean before it,” Trump said, according to AP News. “Pound for pound, coal is the single most reliable, durable, secure and powerful form of energy,” Trump added. “It’s cheap, incredibly efficient, high density, and it’s almost indestructible.”
However, there’s a mountain of evidence that proves burning coal isn’t very clean.
“As the Energy Information Administration explains, producing and using coal has several negative effects on people’s health and the environment. When coal is burned to produce electricity, it emits pollutants, including gases and particulates. Coal mining sometimes requires removing mountain tops with explosives or altering valleys and waterways. Streams can be polluted by runoff from the mines,” according to FactCheck.org.
Coal combustion is more carbon-intensive than burning natural gas or petroleum for electric power production, notes the EPA.
“‘At the present time, coal is not cleaner than its alternatives,’ Joost de Gouw, a chemistry professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, told us in an email, noting that most coal-fired plants already use systems to reduce sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide. ‘Compared with natural gas power plants that use combined cycle technology (the industry standard), current coal-fired power plants emit roughly 10 times more nitrogen oxides and 100 times more sulfur dioxide per kWh of electricity produced,’ referring to kilowatt-hours.”
Devices are available that can remove up to 99% of certain pollutants emitted during coal combustion, FactCheck.org says, but it’s this technology that’s clean, not coal.
“Scrubbers, or flue gas desulfurization units, can remove about 95% of sulfur dioxide emissions from a coal plant before they’re released into the atmosphere. The installation of these devices, the closure of coal-fired plants and the decline of the industry have resulted in a significant decrease of pollution from coal-fired plants,” FactCheck.org continues. “But although these devices can reduce pollution from coal power plants ‘they do not eliminate them,’” said Lucas Henneman, an assistant professor of environmental and infrastructure engineering at George Mason University and author of a 2023 study published in Science.
Henneman added that his second study revealed “most of the exposure to power plant air pollution emissions after 2015 was from power plants with scrubbers.”
Scrubbers don’t remove carbon dioxide.
The fact remains that the energy industry has phased out coal-burning power plants due to cheaper alternatives. Adding CCUS or other pollution-control technology to coal-fired plants will only increase production expenses.
Environmentalists’ perspective and pesky coal ash waste
Environmentalists are outraged at the push to revive coal-fired power plants.
“Coal plants are old and dirty, uncompetitive and unreliable,” said Kit Kennedy, managing director for power at the Natural Resources Defense Council, according to Reuters. “The Trump administration is stuck in the past, trying to make utility customers pay more for yesterday’s energy. Instead, it should be doing all it can to build the electricity grid of the future.”
One of the largest industrial wastestreams in the United States is coal ash, which contains lead, arsenic, mercury, and other toxic materials.
“When stored improperly — especially in unlined ponds near waterways — these heavy metals can seep into groundwater and contaminate drinking supplies,” reports Environmental Health News (EHN). “Coal ash pollution has been linked to increased cancer risks and neurological harm. The 2008 spill in Tennessee, which buried homes and poisoned rivers, remains a stark reminder of the danger. More than 100 million tons of coal ash are generated annually, and much of it sits in legacy ponds at aging or shuttered plants – many without adequate safeguards. Rolling back rules aimed at closing these waste sites safely, and handing more control to states with weaker enforcement records, raises concerns of repeat disasters and long-term environmental damage.”
The Trump administration has said it wants to move coal ash permitting authority to states, which is concerning to environmentalists because of the many documented disasters when companies failed to keep this ash safely stored, according to an AP News article on coal ash rules.
“They are basically just going to rubber-stamp the applications,” said Gavin Kearney, an attorney with the nonprofit Earthjustice.
Legal hurdles
The Biden administration’s MATS rule is still in effect and has already been challenged all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS), where the Court declined to place a hold on it.
“A group of states, mostly led by Republicans and groups supporting the coal industry, led a legal challenge to suspend the MATS rule,” POWER says.
Others question Trump’s basis for action in the use of Section 202(c) emergency authority under the Federal Power Act.
“President Trump’s [EOs] call for action under Federal Power Act 202(c). That law is designed for, and limited to, sudden emergencies creating an immediate risk of blackouts or other grid instability, such as storms, wildfires, or sudden major infrastructure failures. … Changes to the power system over time, like load growth driven by data centers or power plant retirements driven by economics, are properly addressed by planning and action by utilities and their regulators – not by irrational and unlawful emergency actions,” said Ted Kelly, director and lead counsel of U.S. clean energy at the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), in a statement. “We will vigorously oppose these efforts to impose more deadly pollution and higher electricity costs on all Americans.”
Other legal hurdles include state and local climate laws and programs, which have largely withstood legal challenges, notes law firm Sidley Austin LLP.
“For example, California’s cap-and-trade program, designed to compel GHG emission reductions, survived constitutional challenges brought during the first Trump Administration. Likewise, courts rejected constitutional challenges under the dormant Commerce Clause to state-level Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) mandating that a defined percentage of a utility’s electricity be from renewable energy sources. Moreover, the federal government’s ability to preempt state and local laws and programs may be impeded by limited federal jurisdiction over electricity generation that is generally governed at the regional or local level. Hence, any attempts by the federal government to re-litigate RPS laws or challenge recently enacted climate change programs explicitly called out in the orders, such as New York’s Climate Change Superfund Act, may face an uphill legal battle. How that may play out remains uncertain, however, as at this juncture, it is not clear which laws may be identified for review and what legal challenges may be brought.”
What’s next?
The path forward for coal-fired power plants is certain to be rocky. Key deadlines to monitor, according to Sidley, include:
- “By May 8, federal agencies must identify to the Council on Environmental Quality any potential categorical exclusions pursuant to NEPA that could further the production and export of coal.”
- “The Attorney General must submit a report to the President by June 7 detailing actions taken against state laws and policies that burden the use of domestic energy resources and additional recommendations for the executive and/or legislative branches.”
- “The Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of Agriculture, and Secretary of Energy must submit a report to the President by June 7 identifying coal resources and reserves on federal lands and proposing policies to enable the mining of such coal resources.”
- “By June 7, the EPA Administrator, Secretary of Transportation, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Labor, and Secretary of the Treasury must consider revising or rescinding any guidance, regulations, programs, and policies that seek a transition away from ‘coal production and electricity generation.’”
- “The Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of Commerce, and Secretary of Energy must submit a report to the President by June 7 identifying regions where coal-powered infrastructure is available for supporting AI data centers and assessing the potential for expanding coal-based infrastructure to power such data centers.”
Industry is advised to closely monitor these upcoming reports and to watch for opportunities for public comment as these developments continue to unfold.