Trump Gives Big Coal $700 Million Handout to Construct New West Virginia Coal Plant, Extend Life of Others

CHARLESTON, W.Va. - According to reporting, today Donald Trump is set to announce plans to give away $700 million in taxpayer grants for aging, expensive, toxic coal plants-including grants to build a new coal plant in West Virginia. The U.S. has not built a new coal plant in more than a decade due to the staggering health costs and brutal economics.

According to Sierra Club's Out of Control dashboard, coal pollution is responsible for 6,500 premature deaths in the United States every year-a number that will increase as the Trump administration continues to keep the coal industry on life support. Meanwhile, clean energy outperforms coal economically while avoiding coal's negative health effects like hospital visits or missed work days.

Throughout his second term, Trump's Department of Energy (DOE) has illegally extended the life of coal plants, while his Environmental Protection Agency has given coal plants numerous shortcuts and pollution passes and dismantled lifesaving safeguards that protect communities from coal pollution.

Trump's handouts have also left West Virginians on the hook, as DOE previously announced plans to loan local West Virginia utility companies $1.44 billion to fund refurbishment projects at six of the state's coal-fired power plants. At the time of the announcement, no information was given to the public on how the loans would impact energy bills. Sierra Club West Virginia has submitted FOIA requests to the West Virginia Office of Energy and the Governor's Office, but has yet to receive any information on which coal plants will receive money and what that money would be used for.

In response to today's announcement, Lisa Di Bartolomeo, West Virginia's Beyond Coal Campaign Organizer, issued the following statement:

"All but one of West Virginia's ten coal-fired power plants -Longview Power Plant, constructed in 2011- were built before 1993, when smoking on planes or in hospitals was permissible and women couldn't wear pants on the Senate floor. For fifteen years, local utilities have not pursued building a new coal plant in our state. What has changed now? The health consequences of such a decision are as deadly, and the economic repercussions as harrowing, as ever.

"West Virginians are over-burdened by high energy bills, poor water quality, and exacerbated health issues tied to the state's existing fleet of aging, pricey coal plants. Construction of a new plant would mean another high-cost line item on our energy bills and yet another large air polluter and water consumer. Impacts to community health and affordability should be the deciding factor in choosing to take our state decades in the past, not polluter profits."

Jim Kotcon, Conservation Chair for the West Virginia Chapter of Sierra Club, added: "In 2025, 88 percent of all new electric generation added to the grid was from renewables, and renewables have dominated the market for years. Investing in coal is a denial of economic realities and a taxpayer bailout for coal barons, but it will not lower our electric bills. What's next, taxpayer subsidies for buggy whip factories? Renewables are Cheaper, Cleaner, Faster and Safer."

About the Sierra Club

The Sierra Club is America's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit https://www.sierraclub.org.