By Alex Brown, Stateline.org
Mandates from President Donald Trump’s administration to retain aging coal plants could cause a massive spike in energy costs, according to an independent analysis commissioned by several environmental groups.
Orders from the U.S. Department of Energy to save coal plants from retirement could cost ratepayers more than $3 billion per year, according to a report from Grid Strategies, a power sector consulting firm. It was carried out on behalf of Earthjustice, Environmental Defense Fund, Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club.
Under Trump, the agency has issued emergency orders to maintain operations at coal plants that were scheduled for retirement. While federal officials say the coal plants need to stay online to avoid blackouts, power plant owners and state regulators planned their closures because they were no longer economically viable or needed for reliability.
“DOE mandates override those well-informed decisions, inflating electric bills for homeowners and businesses and undermining the competitiveness of U.S. factories and data centers,” the Grid Strategies analysis found.
Across the country, coal plants have phased out as they’ve struggled to compete with cheaper renewables and natural gas. A 2023 analysis by Energy Innovation, a nonpartisan think tank, found that 99% of existing U.S. coal plants “are more expensive to run than replacement by local wind, solar, and energy storage resources.”
But Trump, who has pushed to unleash more fossil fuel development and to stymie wind and solar, has ordered a retiring coal plant in Michigan to stay online, along with an oil and gas plant in Pennsylvania.
“Based on the trend to date and indications that DOE has approached the owners of many retiring fossil power plants about potentially mandating their retention, DOE may attempt to mandate the retention of nearly all large fossil power plants slated for retirement between now and the end of 2028,” reads the Grid Strategies report.
The cost of keeping those plants online would be immense. By 2028, if Trump were to mandate the retention of all fossil fuel plants slated for retirement, the annual cost to ratepayers would be more than $3.1 billion, the analysis found.
The report also considers a number of aging plants that are not yet scheduled for retirement. It finds Trump’s actions could create a “perverse incentive,” causing plant owners to claim they’re planning to shut down, inducing the feds to step in and keep them open, with the cost borne by ratepayers.
Accounting for that possibility, the report found that ratepayer costs could reach $5.9 billion per year to keep the entire aging fossil fuel fleet online. California, Texas and Colorado would see the highest increases in electricity bills.
Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown@stateline.org.
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