Introduction
US President Donald Trump has been using a World War II-era policy to keep old coal plants running, despite high costs and opposition from owners.
Historical Context
In the past, the US electricity grid was powered mainly by coal. However, coal plants have been decommissioned due to high operating costs and risks associated with air pollution, waste, and greenhouse gas emissions.
Trump returned to the White House with a new enthusiasm for reviving the coal industry. His Department of Energy invoked emergency powers to force utilities to keep old plants operating.
Critical Analysis
This policy is considered bad and a misuse of a law designed for wartime, according to scholars and analysts. If allowed to stand, this poses problems for utilities, grid operators, and regulators who plan for decades-long timeframes, only to be overruled by short-term political imperatives that favor certain industries.
"It's just illegal," said Alexandra Klass, a professor at the University of Michigan Law School, about the emergency orders. She served in the Biden administration as a deputy general counsel at the Department of Energy.
Legal Challenges
Environmental advocates and state officials have challenged the orders in court, with cases underway in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Consequences
While the Trump administration props up coal, it aims to slow the deployment of clean alternatives with actions such as a stop-work order on offshore wind and slow-walking permits to build onshore wind.
Klass co-authored a new essay with Dave Owen of UC Law San Francisco in the Michigan Law Review Online, which examines the history and current use of presidential emergency powers on energy.
Conclusion
The Department of Energy, under President Donald Trump, is invoking Section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act, a provision first used by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1941 to meet electricity demand in the Southeastern United States in the run-up to US entry into World War II.
The idea was that the government needed the ability to step in to meet short-term needs when existing regulations failed to do so.
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