Trump administration backed 90 of America’s 184 coal plants with $950 million and pollution waivers, EDF finds

Nearly half of America’s coal power plants have received help from the Trump administration to keep running, according to a new analysis by the Environmental Defense Fund: 90 of the 184 coal plants connected to the national grid got support through taxpayer money, exemptions from pollution rules, or orders to stay open past their planned retirement dates.

The analysis was published on 31 October 2026. EDF argues the support props up old, expensive plants that pollute the air and water around them, while the cost lands on taxpayers and electricity customers. The White House disagrees, saying the administration has saved reliable power plants from closing too soon.

The Department of Energy committed 950 million dollars in taxpayer money to 24 coal plants, 70 plants were given exemptions from Clean Air Act limits on toxic pollution, and the Energy Department used emergency powers to order six coal plants to keep running after they were supposed to close. Some plants received more than one kind of help, which is why the figures add up to more than 90.

At a glance

What happened: A new Environmental Defense Fund analysis found that 90 of America’s 184 grid-connected coal plants received federal support, including 950 million dollars for 24 plants and Clean Air Act exemptions for 70 plants.

Why it matters: Coal plants release mercury, heavy metals and soot. EDF says the support keeps ageing plants open longer, raises costs for taxpayers and bill payers, and leaves nearby communities breathing dirtier air.

What happens next: A federal appeals court has already thrown out one stay-open order, and further legal challenges are expected.

The numbers behind the count

EDF’s tracker, called “Coal Costs Americans”, covers the 184 coal-fired power plants still operating across 39 states. Together, those plants account for 189 generating units. The group says 90 of them, almost half the fleet, have been propped up by the administration.

That is a large share of a shrinking industry. Coal now generates only 17 percent of America’s electricity, down from more than 50 percent 25 years ago, according to EDF, and utilities have been closing coal plants for years because natural gas, wind and solar are usually cheaper. No new coal plant has been built in the United States since 2013.

EDF notes that in 2021, almost every coal plant in the country was more expensive to run than to replace with local wind or solar power, and by 2024, generating power from coal cost 28 percent more than it had in 2021.

Beyond the count of 90 plants, the administration has made 200 billion dollars in low-cost, long-term financing available for coal projects, redirecting money away from clean energy investment, according to EDF. It has also given 100 million dollars to refurbish and modernise coal plants.

How the support worked

Cash from the Energy Department

The Department of Energy committed 950 million dollars in taxpayer money to prop up 24 coal plants, EDF found, helping finance two new plants and bringing one retired plant back online. EDF calculates ratepayers have also shouldered a further 593 million dollars under the stay-open orders, a combined bill of more than 1.5 billion dollars before counting health effects.

EDF also says the administration followed a wish list from a coal trade group. In March 2025, America’s Power asked senior officials to use emergency powers to force coal plants to stay open, to fund them, and to repeal health and environmental protections for coal plants. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin later told coal and mining executives: “Many of the items that were on your wish list are now done.”

Exemptions from pollution rules

The second tool was a set of exemptions from the Clean Air Act. In 2025, the administration handed out exemptions to 154 generating units across 70 coal plants, according to EDF, freeing them from the 2024 update to the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, which had tightened limits on mercury and other heavy metals.

The original Mercury and Air Toxics Standards first took effect in 2015 and cut dangerous pollution from power plants by more than 90 percent. In 2024, the agency tightened the rules further, including a tougher standard for fine particulate matter that lowered allowable emissions of nickel, arsenic, lead and other toxic metals by two-thirds.

Companies were invited early in Trump’s second term to email the administration to ask for an exemption. EDF obtained the emails through Freedom of Information Act requests, and they show companies warning that compliance would cost too much. The administration granted the exemptions, then repealed the 2024 updates in February 2026.

Orders to stay open past retirement

The third tool was the most direct. Under a provision of the Federal Power Act meant for genuine emergencies, the Energy Department repeatedly ordered six coal plants to keep operating past their retirement dates, in some cases for more than a year. These were plants that utilities, state regulators and grid operators had spent years planning to retire as no longer competitive with cleaner power.

EDF says the plants covered by these orders have already added hundreds of millions of dollars to families’ electricity bills and released thousands of tons of harmful air and water pollution, and it estimates families will take on as much as 860 million dollars in new health damages from the orders alone. In September 2026, a federal appeals court found that the Energy Department’s reasons for extending one plant in Michigan were unlawful.

Colstrip: the Montana plant at the centre

The plant most often named is Colstrip, in Montana, one of the oldest large coal facilities in the country. It has operated for more than four decades and has long drawn criticism from nearby communities, including the Northern Cheyenne reservation, over emissions of mercury, arsenic, lead and nickel.

Colstrip’s owners, NorthWestern Energy and Talen Energy, sought an exemption from the updated particulate matter requirement. In March 2025, NorthWestern’s chief executive, Brian Bird, emailed the Department of Energy saying compliance would cost 500 million dollars and was hard to justify for what he called a modest improvement in particle capture.

The administration granted NorthWestern an exemption from the updated 2024 rules before repealing those standards in February. Surbhi Sarang, a director and senior attorney at EDF, said the plant lacks modern pollution controls, and that meeting the newer standard would have required significant upgrades and produced a meaningful drop in air pollution.

NorthWestern, which became Colstrip’s majority owner earlier this year, describes the plant as a dependable bridge to a cleaner energy future. The company said its technology is state of the art for removing sulphur dioxide and is 99.6 percent efficient at removing filterable particulate emissions, and that the 2024 standard would have required 99.8 percent efficiency by 2028, at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars.

WA Parish: the Texas plant and the health numbers

The other plant singled out is WA Parish, outside Houston, Texas, where residents have long pushed for a shutdown, citing carbon emissions and what they describe as hazardous levels of particulate matter.

The plant’s owner, NRG, asked the Energy Department for exemptions for all of its coal-fired facilities, including WA Parish, arguing that the plants would struggle to comply and would have to cut output, threatening affordability and reliability. NRG did not respond to a request for comment.

A 2018 study by Rice University found that WA Parish could be responsible for as many as 177 premature deaths each year from PM 2.5, tiny particles that can enter the bloodstream through the lungs and contribute to respiratory illness, heart attacks and strokes. Rice professor Daniel Cohan has called it the deadliest power plant in Texas.

Cohan said the administration has let coal plants off the hook from the stricter version of the standard, keeping them operating longer than they otherwise would, when many could be replaced by cheaper, cleaner power.

The court pushback

The legal challenge centres on the J.H. Campbell plant in Michigan. Built in the early 1960s, Campbell was scheduled to retire in May 2025, but it has been forced to run in fits and starts ever since under an Energy Department order.

EDF says complying with the order has cost the plant’s owner, Consumers Energy, more than 300 million dollars, and that the plant dumps more than 10,000 pounds of toxic metals directly into Lake Michigan each year. As Consumers Energy raises its rates to recoup the money, EDF says, families in Michigan and across the Midwest are paying about 615,000 dollars every day.

On 11 September 2026, a federal appeals court threw out the Energy Department’s use of emergency powers to hold the Campbell plant open. EDF’s lead counsel for United States clean energy, Ted Kelly, said the court had rejected the administration’s nationwide push to force ageing coal plants to stay online. The ruling does not automatically end the other stay-open orders, but it sets a precedent for future challenges.

What the White House says

The White House has defended the coal policy as a matter of keeping the lights on. White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said the administration has backed and saved more than 100 coal plants this term, preventing the retirement of more than 17 gigawatts of power.

That figure is higher than EDF’s count of 90 plants, but the two numbers are not directly comparable: EDF counts plants that received cash, exemptions or stay-open orders, while the White House counts plants it says were saved from retirement. Neither side has published a plant-by-plant list to match the two counts against each other.

The administration’s broader case is that coal provides reliable, always-available electricity, and that closing plants too quickly risks blackouts and higher prices, especially as demand rises from data centres. EDF disputes the claim that the policy keeps prices down, pointing to a 2026 report by the Natural Resources Defense Council, which found residential electricity rates were 16 percent higher as of May 2026 than before Trump took office.

Why coal was already fading

Coal’s share of American electricity has fallen steadily for decades as cheaper gas, wind and solar have taken its place, and utilities had planned retirements years in advance with grid operators and state regulators.

EDF says that since the start of 2025, the administration has also moved against the alternatives, eliminating federal incentives for clean energy, issuing stop-work orders for projects already under construction and suspending routine permitting for new projects. Even so, EDF notes, enough wind and solar was added in the first half of 2026 to power 5 million American homes for a year.

The administration has also weakened other protections. In September 2026, the Environmental Protection Agency repealed greenhouse gas pollution limits for existing coal-fired power plants, which EDF estimated would cause up to 84,000 premature deaths and up to 3 trillion dollars in health and climate costs over the next twenty years. In April 2026, the agency also proposed weakening protections for the safe management of toxic coal ash.

What happens next

The policy’s immediate future will be decided in part by the courts. The September ruling on the Campbell plant is likely to be followed by challenges to the other stay-open orders, and the administration may appeal. The exemptions are harder to challenge, because the underlying 2024 standards have now been repealed. For now, the count stands at 90 plants out of 184: nearly half of America’s coal fleet is running with federal help. Whether that help is a rescue of reliable power or an expensive favour to a dying industry is the argument that will run through the courts, Congress and the next election.

Frequently asked questions

How many coal plants received support from the Trump administration?

According to the Environmental Defense Fund, 90 of the 184 coal plants on the United States grid received support, almost half of the fleet. The support took three forms: taxpayer money, exemptions from pollution rules, and orders to stay open past planned retirement dates.

How much taxpayer money went to coal plants?

The Department of Energy committed 950 million dollars in taxpayer money to 24 coal plants, according to EDF, helping finance two new plants and bringing one retired plant back online. EDF also says ratepayers shouldered a further 593 million dollars in costs under the stay-open orders.

What were the pollution exemptions?

In 2025, the administration gave Clean Air Act exemptions to 154 generating units across 70 coal plants, freeing them from the 2024 update to the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards. The administration later repealed the 2024 updates in February 2026.

Which plants were named in the analysis?

Two plants were singled out. Colstrip in Montana sought an exemption after its owners said compliance would cost 500 million dollars. WA Parish outside Houston, Texas, was linked by a 2018 Rice University study to as many as 177 premature deaths a year from fine particulate pollution.

What did the courts decide?

On 11 September 2026, a federal appeals court threw out the Energy Department’s use of emergency powers to keep the J.H. Campbell coal plant in Michigan open, finding the department’s justifications unlawful. The ruling does not automatically end the other stay-open orders, but it sets a precedent for future challenges.

What does the White House say about the policy?

White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said President Trump promised to revive the coal industry and that the administration has backed and saved more than 100 coal plants this term, preventing the retirement of more than 17 gigawatts of power. The administration argues coal provides reliable electricity and closing plants too quickly risks blackouts and higher prices.

Conclusion

The Environmental Defense Fund’s count shows how far the Trump administration has gone to keep coal alive: 90 of America’s 184 coal plants, 950 million dollars in taxpayer money, exemptions for 70 plants, and emergency orders forcing six plants to stay open past their retirement dates. The White House calls it a rescue of reliable power. EDF calls it an expensive favour to a dying industry that leaves Americans paying twice, once through their taxes and bills and once through their health. The courts have begun to push back, but the exemptions and the repealed standards will be harder to undo.

This article is for general information and education only. It is not legal or financial advice.

Sources

• https://coalcosts.edf.org/ (Environmental Defense Fund, accessed 1 November 2026)
• https://enmnews.com/2026/10/31/trump-boosts-coal-plants-cash-and-pollution-waivers-edf-says (ENM News, 31 October 2026)
• https://tradersunion.com/news/companies/show/4046902-trump-support-us-coal-plants/ (Traders Union, 31 October 2026)
• https://thework.edf.org/p/dirty-deal (Environmental Defense Fund, 29 October 2026)
• https://www.nrdc.org/resources/affordability-crisis-trumps-own-making (Natural Resources Defense Council, 25 August 2026)