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Page Updated:
Feb. 10, 2024

• • Where Coal Is Retiring, and Hanging On, in the U.S.

  One of the Oldest Power Plants in the U.S., Perched on the Edge of the Nation’s Largest Coal Mine, was Slated To Close in 2027. But...
  
  

  Feb. 6, 2025 -But the plant’s operator recently cancelled the retirement of the 66-year-old station, according to a draft utility plan published in late December.

  Now, three coal-burning units at the Dave Johnston Power Plant, near Glenrock, Wyo., are among dozens nationwide that could keep burning coal far past scheduled retirement dates. Utilities could be taking advantage of growth in energy demand and changes in environmental regulations to keep these plants operating. But experts say that won’t do much to slow coal’s inevitable decline.

• • Why Coal Has Been So Hard to Quit in the U.S.

  What the Economics of Coal-Rich States Like Wyoming Tells Us About the Transition Away From the Dirtiest Fossil Fuel
  
  

  Feb. 6, 2025 - While it once dominated the nation’s power grid, hundreds of units have shuttered over the last two decades and have been largely replaced by natural gas and renewables like solar and wind. More than half of the remaining coal units in the United States are slated for retirement.But as was reported today, since 2017, utilities have extended the life of nearly a third of coal units with planned retirement dates, either through delays or by reversing course and removing retirement goals entirely.

• • Trump Said, ‘We Have More Coal Than Anybody.’

  See Where We Burn It
  
  

  - Jan. 24, 2025 -After declaring a national energy emergency on his first day in office, President Trump said Thursday that coal could be a fuel source for new electric generating plants.

  He announced a plan to issue emergency declarations to build power plants to meet a projected increase in electricity demand for artificial intelligence.

• • The Pope Led Notre Dame Toward Decarbonization

  He Hasn’t Influenced the
  School’s Alabama Coal Investment
  
  

  Jan. 21, 2025 -On issues of climate change, the pope’s influence may stop at the Alabama border.

  Following an unprecedented, forcefully written call to action on climate change from Pope Francis to Catholics and non-Catholics alike in 2015, institutions like the University of Notre Dame, storied in Catholic history, took heed. Almost immediately, the university made pledges to curb its use of fossil fuels and aim toward carbon neutrality—goals the pope had lauded in his environmental appeal. But...

• • The Dirtiest Set of Coal-Fired Power Plants in the US

  Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Operates It
  
  

  Jan. 13, 2025 - A Reuters analysis shows that Berkshire coal plants emit more nitrogen oxide gases than any other coal-fired fleet in the country. Despite big investments in renewable energy, the company has resisted efforts by regulators to make coal plants cleaner.

  Click now for the whole story.

• • Only Five Proposals For Coal Plants Remain Across OECD

  Demand Is Finally Shrinking
  
  

  Dec. 19, 2024 - The number of new coal plants under development in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) region has reached record lows since the signing of the Paris Agreement in 2015.

  The OECD is an intergovernmental organization with 38 member countries, founded in 1961 to stimulate economic growth and global trade. It includes many of the world’s wealthiest countries.

  In all, the number of proposed coal plants in the OECD region has decreased from 142 in 2015 to five today – a 96% fall.

• • Supreme Court Allows Biden Plan to Address Toxic Coal Ash

  The Court’s Order Was Provisional, Rejecting a Request From a Kentucky Electric Utility to Block the Plan...
  
  

  Dec. 11, 2024 -The Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a request from an electric utility in Kentucky to block an Environmental Protection Agency effort to address the health risks presented by coal ash, a toxic substance created by burning coal to produce electricity.

  The court’s brief order gave no reasons, which is typical when it acts on emergency applications. There were no noted dissents.

• • Coal is Not Dead Yet

  Analysis and Forecast to 2027
  
  
  (IEA 50)

  Dec. 10, 2024 -Coal is often considered a fuel of the past, but global consumption of it has doubled in the past three decades. At the height of lockdowns related to the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, demand declined significantly.

  Yet the rebound from those lows, underpinned by high gas prices in the aftermath of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, has resulted in record global coal production, consumption, trade and coal-fired power generation in recent years.

• • From Mine to Shine:

  RWE to Turn Former Coal Mining Sites into Solar and Storage Projects
  
  

  Nov. 22, 2024 -Global renewable energy company RWE Clean Energy is advancing development in Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) territory in a unique way: transforming former coal mining sites into large-scale solar and storage projects.

  RWE has announced a new partnership with Peabody Energy, a coal mining company, to repurpose reclaimed land previously used for mining in Indiana and Illinois. RWE is acquiring a majority interest in R3 Renewables LLC, a joint venture launched by Peabody, which will retain 25% equity interest. RWE is acquiring Summit and Riverstone’s equity interest in R3.

• • This Historic Ship Runs on Coal

  Can It Find a New Way Forward?
  
  

  Oct. 10, 2024 -Boarding the S.S. Badger, a 410-foot freight and passenger ferry that crosses Lake Michigan each summer, is like stepping back in time. A National Historic Landmark, the ship retains many of the original components from when the vessel first entered service in 1953: train tracks that once carried railcars, a telegraph system the captain still uses to communicate with the engine room and two massive engines powered entirely by coal.

  Thirteen tons of coal for each 60-mile crossing, to be precise.

• • Britain Shuts Down Last Coal Plant

  ‘Turning Its Back on Coal Forever’
  
  

  Sep. 30, 2024 -Britain, the nation that launched a global addiction to coal 150 years ago, is shutting down its last coal-burning power station on Monday.

  That makes Britain first among the world’s major, industrialized economies to wean itself off coal — all the more symbolic because it was also the first to burn tremendous amounts of it to fuel the Industrial Revolution, inspiring the rest of the world to follow suit.

• • A Coal Plant Bulldozed an Ohio Town Displacing Residents

  Now Its Owners Include a big Trump Donor
  
  

  Sep. 11, 2024 -Nestled beneath two precipitous spires billowing smoke from what has been called the deadliest coal plant in the United States lies the husk of the small but once-thriving town of Cheshire, Ohio.

  When residents here were routinely shrouded in a toxic, blue-tinged fog of pollution from the plant two decades ago, a unique yet telling solution was settled upon: the company causing the pollution would purchase the entire town to move people en masse from their homes.

• • Coal Baron a No-Show in Alabama Courtroom

  His Abandoned Plant Continues to Pollute Neighborhoods
  
  

  Aug. 24 2024 -The son of West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice was hailed as a hero five years ago when his family’s company purchased a troubled coke plant in North Birmingham that had polluted three historically Black neighborhoods. Now, a judge says the Justices’ Bluestone Coke is on a “superhighway to contempt.”

• • A Longwall Coal Mine Grows Beneath an Alabama Town
  

  Neighbors of an Explosion Victim Feel Undermined and Unheard
  
  

  June 25, 2024 -Lily Spicer felt the energy of the explosion surge through her body.

  She was talking to her daughter on the phone when the boom came. Her family was accustomed to the occasional blasts that would sometimes shake their windows, she said. But this was different.

• • Nevada Battery Storage System Now Online at Former Coal Site

  Will Provide 220
  MW/440 MWh of Power
  
  

  Apr. 28, 2024 -Grid-scale storage developer Energy Vault and NV Energy announced the completion and beginning of commercial operation of the Reid Gardner Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) in Moapa, Nevada.

  Built on the site of a decommissioned coal-fired electric generating facility, the the two-hour, 220 MW/440 MWh grid-tied battery system is charged and discharged on a daily basis and designed to dispatch stored renewable energy at peak consumption hours.

  The system, which is now being operated at full capacity by NV Energy, leverages Energy Vault’s integration platform and energy management system, Vault-OS.

• • Duke Energy Calls For New Resources

  Where It Comes From

  POWER Engineering, Feb. 1, 2024, Duke Energy has provided a resource plan update to regulators this week, calling for new generation additions in response to the Carolinas’ rapid growth.

  In a filing to the North Carolina Utilities Commission (NCUC), the utility forecasted even greater electricity demand than projected in the proposal last summer.

  Duke said “new economic development wins, including manufacturing and technology projects across the Carolinas” make up the primary driver of the increased electric demand. The utility said annual demand expects to increase 22% by 2030 and 25% by 2035 from 2022 planning cycles — driven by significant additional economic development activity that took place during 2023.

• • Coal Plants Made a Comeback in 2023

  The Push Was Driven by China
  
  

  Apr. 10, 2024 -Global capacity to generate power from coal, one of the most polluting fossil fuels, grew in 2023, driven by a wave of new plants coming online in China that coincided with a slowing pace of retirements of older plants in the United States and Europe.

  The findings came in an annual report by Global Energy Monitor, a nonprofit organization that tracks energy projects around the world.

• • End of coal in NH

  Schiller Station in Portsmouth to Become 'Renewable Energy Park'

  (Seacoastronline), Mar. 27, 2024, Granite Shore Power (GSP) will permanently end coal-fired operations at Schiller Station and plans to convert the defunct facility into a battery energy storage system.

  GSP is additionally ending coal-fired operations at Merrimack Station in Bow, as part of a settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — following lawsuits by the Conservation Law Foundation and the Sierra Club.

• • Coal Mines Under Homes - Not Such a Good Idea
  

  After an Explosion, Two Were Left Critically Injured
  
  

  Mar. 15, 2024 -He’d said he thought his home would explode. He was right.

  W.M. Griffice, 78, had told his granddaughter, Kenzie, in the days leading up to March 8 that he felt like his house was going to explode, she recalled.

  Company representatives with Oak Grove, a nearby coal mine, had visited Griffice’s home in Adger, a small town 25 miles southwest of Birmingham, multiple times.

• • Toxic Coal Ash: ‘Widespread Noncompliance’
  With the Nation’s First Regulations
  

  The Latest EPA Report
  
  

  Feb. 8, 2024 -There is “widespread noncompliance” with the nation’s first regulations on coal ash, the toxic waste left after coal is burned for electricity, the Biden administration recently announced.

  Click now for the rest of the story.

• • Bank of America Pledged to Stop Financing Coal, But...

  Now It's Backtracking
  
  

  Feb. 5, 2024 -Two years ago, Bank of America won kudos from climate activists for saying it would no longer finance new coal mines, coal-burning power plants or Arctic drilling projects because of the toll they take on the environment.

  The changes come as Republican lawmakers step up efforts to punish businesses that consider climate change and the environment in their operations.