Coal Plants Keep Shutting Despite Trump’s Order to Rescue Them

[GennGreymane]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...to-rescue-them

President Donald Trump has ordered a rescue of the nation’s struggling coal and nuclear power industries, but that doesn’t mean utilities are reconsidering the shutdown of unprofitable plants.

Many power generators contacted said Trump’s June 1 announcement hasn’t altered their plans to retire old units even as the administration dangles the prospect of using emergency powers to force grid operators to buy power from struggling plants.

“I will tell you it is not a matter of if we are going to retire our coal fleet in this nation, it’s just a matter of when,” Ben Fowke, Xcel Energy Inc.’s chief executive officer, said June 6 at a utility trade group conference. The company announced later that day that it would retire two coal-fired units in Colorado and add thousands of megawatts of capacity from renewable power and natural gas.

That trend has been underway for years. Since 2010, nearly 40 percent of the capacity of the nation’s fleet of coal-fired power plants has either been shut down or designated for closure, according to the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, a trade-group that represents coal-fired utilities and mining companies such as Peabody Energy Corp., and Murray Energy Corp.

More than a quarter of U.S. nuclear power plants don’t make enough money to cover their operating costs, raising the threat of early retirements, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

Earlier: Trump Orders Action to Stem Coal, Nuclear Plant Shutdowns

Trump ordered Energy Secretary Rick Perry on June 1 to take immediate action to stem further coal and nuclear plant closures in the name of national security. The Trump administration argues that the loss of coal and nuclear plants is harming the dependability of the U.S. power grid and its ability to recover from storms or cyber attacks.

But utilities are reluctant to reverse course on plans put in motion years ago or to backtrack on pledges to embrace renewable energy. Plant closures that have been worked out under consent decrees to settle environmental lawsuits or in deals with state regulators also can’t be easily reversed.

“Once utilities have gone public and announced what they are going to do they may be at the point of no return unless something extraordinary comes up,” said James Lucier, managing director of research firm Capital Alpha Partners LLC.

More: Shutting Down Coal-Power Plants the Wall Street Way, With Bonds

And there is doubt, too, that the administration’s use of rarely used emergency authority will withstand court challenges.

“We don’t think it’s legal,” Abe Silverman, head of regulatory affairs for power producer NRG Energy Inc., said in a phone interview. The Energy Department didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Among the companies that said they are going forward with plant retirements despite Trump’s order is Michigan-based CMS Energy Corp., which announced June 13 it was shutting down two coal-fired units at one of its aging coal plants. The company doesn’t intend to change previously announced plans to shut three other coal plants, spokesman Brian Wheeler said. Likewise, utility giant Southern Co. says its plans for future shutdowns won’t be impacted by whatever the Trump administration puts forward, Schuyler Baehman, a company spokesman said.

Even FirstEnergy Solutions Corp., the Ohio-based power generator that requested an emergency bailout for its money-losing plants says it still plans to retire four coal units and three nuclear reactors, said spokesman Thomas Mulligan.

As World Edges Away From Coal, Trump Seeks Revival: QuickTake

“Certainly I think right now utilities are considering going forward with retirement plans as is,” Richard Glick, a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission said in an interview. “It’s pure economics. Gas prices are way down, renewable projects are getting much less expensive and they are beating other older technologies out in the markets.”

New Jersey-based PSEG Power, for instance, won’t halt its move to close Connecticut’s last coal-fired power plant by 2021, spokeswoman Melissa Ficuciello said by email. And nuclear plant operator Exelon Corp. said it would move forward with shutting down its 625 megawatt nuclear reactor at New Jersey’s Oyster Creek Generating Station, as part of a deal with the state. The reactor, which is the oldest commercial nuclear power plant in America, will permanently shut down this October.

Overall, Moody’s Investors Service estimates that the 35 gigawatts of capacity from coal and nuclear plants scheduled to be shutdown in the next five years will be more than made up for by the 104 gigawatts expected from natural gas and renewable projects in the works.

To be sure, others utilities weren’t so quick to write it off the Trump administration’s plans. And others said they wouldn’t be able to make a decision until more details come to light.

Related: One-Fourth of U.S. Nuclear Fleet Is at Risk of Early Closure

Chris Crane, the CEO of Exelon, the country’s largest nuclear operator, told Utility Drive on the sidelines of the Edison Electric Institute convention in San Diego earlier this month there’s no grid emergency to justify the bailout of coal and nuclear plants. Later at the same conference, he said he wants the Trump administration to act on the plan.

“I don’t know how you call it, emergency or non-emergency, but we want action. This administration supports action. We support this administration,” Crane said.

A spokesman for the company, Paul Adams, later said in a statement, “We can’t speculate on the potential solutions outlined in the leaked draft memo.”

Columbus, Ohio-based American Electric Power Company Inc. said it is likely to seek approval from regulators to shut its three-unit, 1,600 megawatt coal-fired power plant in Conesville, Ohio if it doesn’t qualify for subsidies or “there are not other changes in the market,” company spokeswoman Tammy Ridout said in phone interview.

But that doesn’t signal a wholesale shift in direction. Plans to close another 450 megawatt coal unit at the company’s Northeastern Plant in Oklahoma in 2026 due to a regional haze settlement are proceeding as planned.

AEP has retired 7,200 megawatts of coal power since 2011, and announced plans to invest heavily in natural gas and renewables.

“I think from our perspective we will continue moving toward a clean energy economy,” AEP Chairman Nicholas Akins said in an interview. “When you look at the future and the investment potential and the risk associated with these investments by far the best approach is with natural gas, renewables and in fact technology."

[Machismo]

I guess we need more welfare for the Trumpsters.

[THEORACLE64]

Dying industry tbh. Trump, of course, was an idiot to think American would be saved by going on an industry people are caring less and less about. Bye. This isn't the 1950's nuclear American family era, Donald.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

I guess we need more welfare for the Trumpsters.

So why do people call trump supporters trumpeters and not trumpets? Wouldn’t trumpets make more sense because then you could say they got played by trump?

[The Stormbringer]

So why do people call trump supporters trumpeters and not trumpets? Wouldn’t trumpets make more sense because then you could say they got played by trump?

Trumpeters because they love trumpeting what Trump says as if it's a commandment from god handed over to them personally.

[Darsithis]

Good. Say goodbye to dirty, nasty coal.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Trumpeters because they love trumpeting what Trump says as if it's a commandment from god handed over to them personally.

Hmm I suppose that makes sense, I wonder if that ends up with more or less trumpets being metaphorically played.

[Machismo]

So why do people call trump supporters trumpeters and not trumpets? Wouldn’t trumpets make more sense because then you could say they got played by trump?

That's not a bad idea. Personally, I prefer Trumpster, as it sounds like "dumpster," but is in no way a literal insult.

[jazen]

But, but, we can't #MAGA without coal.

[Deleted]

Good. Say goodbye to dirty, nasty coal.

You know people's are being destroyed by this, dickhead.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

You know people's are being destroyed by this, dickhead.

You could argue people are also being destroyed by Gobal warning caused by things like coal sooooo.

[Machismo]

You know people's are being destroyed by this, dickhead.

Maybe those people should pull themselves up by the bootstraps and learn a new trade.

Moving past inefficient and antiquated technologies is a good thing.

[Darsithis]

You know people's are being destroyed by this, dickhead.

That's life. That's how industries work. That's how technology and society progresses. Today, most of humanity enjoys a level of comfort and standard of living unmatched at any point in our history, precisely because we've moved on, shedding unwieldy industries.

I get that people lose their jobs. I know that some of them may not find anything else as a result, especially if their entire lives were devoted to coal mining. Not all will experience that, a large portion can apply their skills in other industries.

If you really cared, what you'd do is, instead of trying to prop up a dirty, corrupt, ecologically-devastating and, in the end, economically un-viable industry, contribute to social charities and funds (gov and private) designed to help people in just this type of situation recover.

[EbonBehelit-]

The Australian government is trying to do something similar.

It speaks volumes that conservative governments consistently brag about their economic mastery, despite their immense reluctance to invest in the industries of the future. I'd be happy about this blowing up in their faces, but all it really means in the end is that our countries will be left behind while others reap the economic rewards.

[Deleted]

Maybe those people should pull themselves up by the bootstraps and learn a new trade.

Moving past inefficient and antiquated technologies is a good thing.

There are a lot of issues around this. However partisan points-scoring around the death of entire communities and a way of life is not something to celebrate in some kind of self-congratulatory shallow gloatfest.

(and no I'm not a fucking Trump supporter)

[melodramocracy]

Weird. It's almost as if the president is full of shit.

Next thing you're gonna tell us that Mexico isn't going to pay for the wall.

[Deleted]

That's life. That's how industries work. That's how technology and society progresses.

Yes we were told all this crap (by conservatives), in the UK in the 1980's. We now have spiralling and increasingly unaffordable energy prices, and that energy is supplied almost universally by foreign suppliers which poses a significant threat to our security.

As for what is and is not ecologically devastating, you are obviously ignorant of the history of energy: nuclear power was once seen as a clean, futuristic energy source.

The miners do not want handouts-they want to work. And sure some of them a racist arseholes. But most of them either didn't vote or didn't vote for Trump and their plight shouldn't be dismissed in a cavalier fashion by the irritatingly smug.

[Doctor Funkenstein]

You know people's are being destroyed by this, dickhead.

You know they have the option to adapt by adopting other technologies instead. For every job lost, other jobs become available. By your idiotic and asinine logic, we should still be clubbing giant cats and spearing mammoths and eating their flesh raw, because progress shouldn't be done if it messes up the status quo and people's livelihoods are at risk! I mean the bronze age alone totally tore a hole in those poor stone age craftspeople's livelihoods!!! THE DICKHEADS!!!!

[Darsithis]

Yes we were told all this crap (by conservatives), in the UK in the 1980's. We now have spiralling and increasingly unaffordable energy prices, and that energy is supplied almost universally by foreign suppliers which poses a significant threat to our security.

I don't have anything to debate that since I don't know the situation there. I'm referring to industries in a general sense, for instance, we no longer manufacture our weapons using blacksmiths. Hand-making clothes is now a speciality thing instead of completely normal. Even in more modern times: thanks to the internet, we don't print nearly as many books/magazines/newspapers as we did before. Thanks to cars we no longer employ people to clean up horse corpses and crap from the streets.

As for what is and is not ecologically devastating, you are obviously ignorant of the history of energy: nuclear power was once seen as a clean, futuristic energy source.

And it still is. It's a misconception that nuclear plant waste is so awful. Watt-by-watt, nuclear is far cleaner than coal.

The miners do not want handouts-they want to work. And sure some of them a racist arseholes. But most of them either didn't vote or didn't vote for Trump and their plight shouldn't be dismissed in a cavalier fashion by the irritatingly smug.

Who is dismissing it?

As for handouts, well, that's their choice, of course, but it's important to have those social nets in place to help people who end up on the wrong end of things.

[Feel The Power]

Dying industry tbh. Trump, of course, was an idiot to think American would be saved by going on an industry people are caring less and less about. Bye. This isn't the 1950's nuclear American family era, Donald.

The better guess is that Trump knew well beforehand the situation of coal being a dying industry (regardless of his intervention), as well as knowing the average person does not know coal plants are being phased out. He comes out looking like the hero in a variety of ways to the average Trump-puppet by trying to intervene with the coal industry: 1st He gets to look like he is saving jobs and 2nd when the coal industry inevitably fails, he gets to gloat and look like the guy who tried to save it. He'll of course never mention that it was just putting bandaids on a bloating corpse.