This article was originally published in Coal Zoom and is re-published here with permission.
First, let’s establish the stark reality of coal’s contribution to American Society during crises over the last decade:
2014 Polar Vortex brought extreme cold across the U.S. resulting in record winter peak electric demands. Coal provided the majority of electricity but, even more importantly, coal power increased 92% YOY to meet the load. Oil increased 12%, Wind 9% and Nuclear 7%. Natural gas (NG) generation decreased 6% YOY and Hydro declined 15%. Solar was irrelevant. NG was diverted to space heating needs and prices in the Northeast exceeded $100/ MMBtu. New England Utilities resorted to burning jet fuel.
2019 “Cold Event” a severe cold wave caused by an Arctic Polar Vortex hit the East and Midwest leading to fatalities. In the PJM region (65 million people) coal power led all fuels at 37% of electricity. All renewables combined contributed only 7% of electricity. In the MISO region (45 million people), coal provided 50 % of electricity and operated at 73 % of installed capacity.
2021: Winter Storm Uri impacted much of the U.S. Extreme cold forced the MISO grid, which stretches across 15 states and Manitoba, to make emergency load reduction. Coal-based generation surged 36% and met almost 50% of demand. Solar power was virtually non-existent, and MISO reported that “output from wind generation was low throughout the duration of the event.” NG prices increased from less than $3 per MMBTU to as much as $700.
2024: Winter storm, multiple cold weather fronts moved across the country, setting low-temperature records. Energy Ventures Analysis (EVA) noted that across the three storms, coal-fired power plants showed the most significant increase in utilization rates: “Wind generation faced challenges… while solar generation was entirely or almost entirely absent.” Further, EVA concluded: “Higher shares of solar facilities and fewer dispatchable resources likely would have resulted in widespread power outages.”
2025 Polar Vortex: Demand across the East, Midwest, and South reached 537 GW in January – the highest ever recorded and approximately 150 GW above average. Per EVA, coal-fired generation “played a vital role” as capacity factors reached 70%. At peak demand, wind and solar were only able to generate 3% and .0.2% of the electricity to meet the load. NG prices spiked to $30/MMBtu compared to coal’s $2.50. EVA estimated coal saved customers up to $1.4 billion.
Now, put these data in the context of the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s 2025 Annual Energy Outlook published just this past April. Despite the experiences presented above, the EIA “Reference Case” projects that within 10 years coal will be largely removed from the American energy landscape. Coal capacity will decline from 170 GW to only 3 GW—a decline of 98%. Meanwhile, coal will produce less than 1% of the Nation’s electricity in 2035. Also, coal production will decline from 500 million tons to 167 million and only 27 million tons will be used by power plants. In essence, the coal franchise will basically disappear in the U.S.
Solar, which has already demonstrated its inability to provide electricity in a cold crisis, is projected by the EIA to increase capacity from 127 GW to 476 GW. Solar generation is forecasted to grow from 200 billion kWh to over 1,000 billion kWh (a 400% increase). Wind, whose track record in winter is only slightly better than solar, is projected to grow capacity from 153 GW to 350 GW in just 10 years. Wind generation is forecasted to increase from 447 billion kWh to over 1,150 billion. According to the EIA, the U.S. will become ever more dependent on intermittent and non-dispatchable power as both nuclear and NG based electricity are projected to decline while coal is eliminated. Meanwhile, China, India and others are building baseload units (especially coal) to meet the reliability requirements of the next generation of AI and its associated Data Centers. These international planners of AI technology are well aware of the warning by Potomac Economic Research Group: “Increased intermittent output and its associated fluctuations … has resulted in more frequent emergency events.”
Some in the industry may scoff at the EIA projections because President Trump has taken several first steps to support coal. But keep in mind the President’s term ends in 43 months. Will it be back to Business as Usual?
Don’t forget, coal generating capacity has declined from almost 300 GW to 170 GW in the past decade. It is not much of a reach to see how 170 GW can turn into 3 GW in another 10 years. The “War Against Coal” is pervasive, relentless and heavily funded. Multi-Billionaire Michael Bloomberg has committed $500 million to eliminate coal and his support for the Sierra Club’s “Beyond Coal” Campaign is clear: “We want to close all U.S. coal plants.” As many as 200 lawyers and organizers have been hired to litigate and work against coal. They attend hearings, lobby regulators, give speeches, talk to classrooms, write editorials and have been markedly successful in demonizing coal. And, if EIA is correct, the worst is yet to come.
Comment: Coal’s role as a Cornerstone Fuel goes far beyond winter crises but is a 24/7 contributor to reliable and affordable electricity all year round. And, as far as summer heat goes, this paper is being written in a heatwave (June 26), where, even after the closure of hundreds of power plants, coal-based electricity still underpins key U.S. Federal Power Markets: MISO-32%. PJM-19%, SPP-33% – Just these three Markets stretch across 43 states, Manitoba and the District of Columbia.
Frank Clemente PhD Is Professor Emeritus at Penn State University. He specializes in research on the socioeconomic impact of energy policy and is the author of The Global Value of Coal, published by the International Energy Agency (2012). Professor Clemente has extensive experience in speaking, writing and presenting data on the value of coal to the U.S. and around the world. All opinions expressed here are presented independently from the University.
Fred Palmer Esq. served as CEO of Western Fuels before he joined Peabody Energy as Senior Vice President for Government Affairs. Palmer was Chair of the World Coal Association Board and a member of the National Coal Council. He received the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical and Petroleum Engineers Award for “Distinguished Achievement in Coal Technology.” He also received a Statement of Appreciation from the National Coal Council in 2015 with a plaque for “Guidance since 1990.”
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
The only viable addition to coal is nuclear, and it looks like the small modular reactors might catch on, however, why not place the coal-fired generators into standby, just in case? The EIA has a DEI (Dumb Environmental Idiots) problem, in addition to Bloomie throwing chump change to the Greenies? Let’s hope Vance follows Trump.
A big coal plant takes about 8 hours to start up to full power.
And China is building coal fired power stations like there’s no tomorrow. Fifteen years ago (personal experience) the smog from coal was so bad you could taste it and couldn’t see the morning Tai Chi in the square below from the 7th floor of the hotel. Has China improved that ugliness in the last ten years?
Clearly, authors with a passionate interest in coal. But consider this:
“Don’t forget, coal generating capacity has declined from almost 300 GW to 170 GW in the past decade. It is not much of a reach to see how 170 GW can turn into 3 GW in another 10 years.“
The last new US coal station was commissioned in 2013. That means people stopped planning new coal stations around 2005. Why? It wasn’t renewables then. It was the shift in economics to favor gas. And no amount of kvetching about renewables with change that. There was a “war on coal” back then, and gas won.
George W Bush was rather a green, and acted as if the Green Blob was acting in good faith.
Not our smartest president. 🙂
Recently because of stupid politicians believing the crap spewed by the climate grifters.
USA has plenty of good coal, and they will bring much of it back as wind and solar are proving more and more a parasite on the supply system and gas becomes more expensive.
As usual, Nick can’t tell the difference between government activity and market forces.
Or is that he doesn’t believe there is any difference.
So which is it? Looks to me that market forces terminated coal stations around 2005, and nothing will bring them back. Who will put up the money?
Why do you say nothing will bring them back? Economics change, and coal is already at parity with NG. A new coal-burning power-plant is being built in Wyoming. It won’t be the only one.
Who will put up the money? Owners of AI data centers are signing long-term commitments for power. Powercos have the resources and access to financial markets to fund construction.
Nick has the phony EPA/DOE reports/forecasts to back up him and his left wing woke co-hordes
Ah yes, the mysterious “shift in economics”, the dismal science (sic) that knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing.
What actually happened was an unanticipated super-abundance of (natural) gas production, as a byproduct of the new tight-oil production fields — the earth-shaking innovation known as horizontal-drilling / hydraulic fracturing aka frac’ing.
‘Byproduct’ is actually too kind a word — the gas was actually unwanted, a nuisance, one that (for safety concerns) would normally be ‘flared’, i.e. at the wellhead burned (combustion, as in CH4 + 2 O2 => CO2 + 2 H2O). Bright flares, as far as one could see, while driving nocturnally thru the Eagle Ford or Permian oilfields.
New regulations limiting this ‘wasteful’ (safety) practice meant building storage and / or transporting the gas, either as compressed / CNG or in pipelines (expensive infrastructure). There were seasons, in most of those years, where the wholesale gas price was negative (!) — how’s that for economics? — one could be paid for taking the surplus gas off their hands, and then it’d be your problem to store it or process it into something valuable (like electricity).
This resulted in a great fuel-switching scramble, like small-scale conversion of buses etc. from diesel to CNG-fueled engines, or at a grand scale to new gas-fired power plants. The ‘clean-burning / low-carbon’ aspect was only a marketing cover, as the driving force was the near-zero price of the (temporary) surplus / superabundance of gas.
But the worm turns, slowly: an export industry gradually arises — pipelines to ports built specifically to super-chill and thereby condense (liquefy) the surplus into LNG, for export on specially fitted tankers — all in order to ship the gas to overseas ports, built to reverse the process.
Soaking up the surplus, in this way, meant that domestic wholesale prices start to trend upward toward those on the ‘global market’, where there never was such a surplus. Which evolution, if ever it is ~ completed, would almost surely mean that coal-fired power would again become much lower-cost than gas-fired.
To anyone who hoping to discern some economic law or inevitability in this saga, Good Luck!
More to the point, it’s hard to see anything in this ‘evolution-devolution’ that applies to wind-solar-batteries-inverters +++ short of connecting a worldwide electric grid / electricity market, the ultimate dream-project [for another time]
“Soaking up the surplus, in this way, meant that domestic wholesale prices start to trend upward toward those on the ‘global market’, where there never was such a surplus. Which evolution, if ever it is ~ completed, would almost surely mean that coal-fired power would again become much lower-cost than gas-fired.”
Indeed so. I get a lot of downvotes when I try to explain this here.
But it hasn’t happened yet. And it will have to go a long way before coal can compete. And meanwhile US consumers may decide that they aren’t so keen on paying global prices.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2025/07/14/the-u-s-without-coal-good-luck/#comment-4093894
You get downvotes because you apply an extremely blinkered and disingenuous view to the problem. What Whetten doesn’t mention, probably because he felt it wasn’t necessary, is that simultaneous to the glut of US gas production, the EPA rolled out regulations that effectively prevented the construction of new coal power, forced the closure of coal mines, and consequently drove up the cost of coal energy far beyond what it had previously been. Even without the gas boom, coal would have been forced into a decline – not because of mere market forces, but because of harsh government intervention that prevented it from being competitive with the alternatives.
Similar regulations were rolled out in most of western Europe at around the same time, or even earlier, which is why nearly no new coal was built anywhere in the west after the turn of the century; gas was cheap, coal generation had immense expense and delay in its construction and was prohibitively expensive to run in comparison.
The same was done with nuclear
The article illustrates how gas prices skyrocket during bitter cold weather and make coal the far better choice for electric generation.
Not only superior from a price standpoint during cold snaps, but coal can be stockpiled and gas can’t. So gas presents another point of potential disruption (supply interruptions) that coal doesn’t.
The US is “the Saudi Arabia of Coal.” It is idiotic not to use it.
From Grok:”The “boom” really took off around 2005–2010, particularly in shale formations like the Marcellus in Pennsylvania and the Bakken in North Dakota.”
NicK, I wonder if this fracking thing that really took off around 2005 had anything to do with coals decline. The price of gas dropped like a rock and it saved lots of us in the northern US.
Thanks for responding in this constructive way.
On this much —
we’ll just have to agree to disagree, or just watch & see.
We should keep our God-given natural gas to make goods and services for domestic use and export, instead of exporting LNG, so OUR RIP-OFF, TRADING PARTNERS make gods and services for export to the US.
If they do not buy our exports, we impose tariffs until they do.
We are so screwed by US self-serving, pseudo, enviros and UN-American evildoers using the big foghorn of the Corporate Media to brainwash us.
And we know they want to phase out gas also. Fossil Fuels ain’t they? 😉
Coal and NG costs are almost at parity, and coal is forecasted to be cheaper than NG before the end of the year.
In the next five years, hundreds of power plants are expected to be constructed. A lack of adequate natural gas pipeline capacity in some regions is hindering the construction of new data centers or expansions to existing ones, and is leading to higher predicted power costs for NG. For those areas with reasonable access to railroads, coal will become a much faster and cheaper route.
Wyoming will not be the only state to build a new coal-burning power plant.
Mine-mouth, low-sulfur, low-ash coal, connected to the grid to send the low-cost, STEADY electricity all over the place, 24/7/365
NO SUBSIDIES
.
Assume 1800 MW (three x 600 MW), coal plant, turnkey-cost at $10 b
Life 50 years; CF 0.9
Payment to bank, $5 b at 6% for 50 y; $316 m/y x 50 = $15.8 b
Payment to Owner $5 b at 10% for 50 y; $504 m/y x 50 = $21.2 b
Life-time production, base-loaded mode, 1800 x 8766 x 0.9 x 50 = 710,046,000 MWh
Electricity cost = (15.8 + 21.2) x 1,000,000,000/710,046,000,000 = 0.0521 $/kWh
.
O&M escalates at 4%, insurance escalates at 4%, periodic overhauls are ignored
For lower electricity cost/kWh, borrow more money, say 70%
Nuclear has similar economics
Assume 1800 MW (three x 600 MW), coal plant, turnkey-cost at $10 b
Life 50 years; CF 0.9
Payment to bank, $5 b at 6% for 50 y; $316 m/y x 50 = $15.8 b
Payment to Owner $5 b at 10% for 50 y; $504 m/y x 50 = $21.2 b
Life-time production, base-loaded mode, 1800 x 8766 x 0.9 x 50 = 710,046,000 MWh
O&M escalates at 4%, insurance escalates at 4%, periodic overhauls are ignored
For lower electricity cost/kWh, borrow more money, say 70%
Nuclear has similar economics
Wyoming coal, at mine-mouth $15/ton, 8600 Btu/lb. plant efficiency 40%
Btu/ton = 2000 x 8600 = 17.2 million
Lifetime coal use = 710,046,000,000 kWh x (3412 Btu/kWh/0.4)/17200000 Btu/ton = 353 million ton
Lifetime coal cost at $15/ton = $5.3 billion
Electricity cost = (15.8 + 21.2 + 5.3) x 1,000,000,000/710,046,000,000 = 0.06 $/kWh
Let’s not forget the ever-tightening ratchet of EPA regulations affecting coal plants. And Obama signaled, even before he was elected, that he would make coal power plants too expensive to operate. And he had 8 years to do it.
So, if you are a prospective power plant builder and the government indicates it is going to make it their priority to increase your costs in a multi-billion, long term investment, what would you do?
Clemente & Palmer argue well the case for the role of coal specific to domestic electric-power generation in these USofA, especially for scaling up in an acute crisis, such as the cases mentioned. Which makes sense, given that the electric-power grid remains critical to an industrialized economy.
But it’s worth keeping in mind that there also come longer-term crises (wars & similar embargo / blockades) that arise less frequently, thankfully. To be prepared for those, coal-mining and subsequent processing operations needs to be maintained and even advanced to worldwide best standards. History provides striking examples of these:
Coal can be converted into liquid fuels and combustible gases, retaining most of its heat-value, e.g. by steam reforming (reaction with H2O) or by hydro-liquefaction. This has been part of both World Wars, in the desperate scramble for motor fuels in the late (losing) stages. Also in the case of embargoes, such as the long one against Republic of South Africa (SASOL), and as prepared for in the 1970s crisis in America.
Coal can similarly be substituted for crude-oil fractions as a feedstock in the petrochemical industries. This would be an emergency-driven reversion to practices that dominated in the 19th-Century chemicals industry, before displacement by liquid and gas hydrocarbons.
Coal steam-reforming can also substitute for natural-gas in the di-hydrogen (H2) production step of the synthesis of agricultural fertilizers. The byproduct carbon (CO2) is valuable for horticulture – aquaculture i.e. the (true) greenhouses.
Of course, all these substitutions are derided as more expensive (despite the lower cost of feedstock), messier, and especially as requiring capital-intensive & lengthy construction projects. Which is a definitive counter-argument — at least in peacetime and in acute crises (above).
Besides these added & (sadly) foreseeable justifications for keeping an up-to-date industrial base for coal mining and processing, a couple of other things:
As an Export Industry: If the USA were really the ‘Saudi Arabia of Coal’, then in the longer course of electrification projects worldwide there may be humanitarian & strategic argument for producing and distributing coal & its best uses to places of desperate fuel (& power) poverty. Anti-hoarding good.
As a staging ground to develop practices for lower-grade hydrocarbon ores: One doesn’t hear much about this, since the early ’80s, but the unimaginably vast resources of tar-sands, of kerogen, etc. motivate improved production methods, such as in situ (in mine) conversion to higher grade liquid products. The relevance to ever-improving coal-mining & -processing should be obvious: don’t lose sight of these really long-term objectives.
Finally, on a personal note, we’ve seen that the ‘War on Coal’ doesn’t really shut it down. Like any other valuable resource / product, it just creates a black (or grey) market. Almost within site of our No. Arizona residence, there remain the abundant coal-fields and infrastructure that supported the Navajo Generating Station (extra electric power for cities like Las Vegas or in Southern California), prematurely closed in order to make way (supposedly) for wind & solar generation. The people there still ‘dig coal’ and distribute it locally, for cash or barter, to burn cheaply and perhaps less cleanly for space-heating, cooking &c. Out of sight, out of mind (off the ledger / tax books). Nothing noble about that.
Sources: I’ve composed this one freestyle, without reference to anything but memory (however faulty). Which probably means it’s error- and omission-ridden. Apologies
I have no respect for EIA. Worthless projections of greater use of wind and solar and phasing out of coal appears to be nothing more than the CAGW talking points repeated. That won’t cut it. No one has shown that wind and solar can be the primary supplier to the grid. Exactly the opposite is being shown, every heat wave or cold snap causes wind and solar to drop off. No matter how much wind and solar is built the outcome will be the same. Only difference is that the more wind and solar we have the more vulnerable the grid becomes to the point of collapse. There is no replacement for fossil fuel and nuclear, we all know that. EIA’s primary and sole responsibility should be stable energy production and transmission. Wind and solar can never provide that, if the EIA can’t see that they need to be dismantled, we would be better off without them.
Yep.
After ~ 40 years of trying, not one country, state, region, municipality, county, city, town or village has demonstrated that it can run 24 x 7 x 52 exclusively on grid-scale wind and / or solar generated electricity.
A couple of days in a given week does not cut it as a reliable grid-scale power supply.
Fire all the woke yokels at the EPA and DOE who wrote those projection reports.
At present, they are hiding, lying low, like the millions of illegals
A clean slate is needed
The grid has been severely, and dangerously degraded by costly, unreliable wind and solar, while coal power has been either destroyed or sidelined, used only for emergencies. We need to bring coal power back, while phasing out wind and solar, to re-stabilize the grid, and keep electricity costs down. Coal can compete with NG, but first, it must be allowed to.
The grid has been severely, and dangerously degraded by costly, unreliable wind and solar,
With state sponsored dumping by spaghetti and meatballs dilute fickles cutting large hub and spoke dispatchable coal’s breakfast lunch and dinner. No matter as taxpayers pick up the burgeoning spaghetti costs while gas picks up the fickles meatballs insurance costs with fast start peaking plants.
Completely forgotten in the vision splendid were the electricity consumers who require dispatchable power at the correct voltage and frequency. No matter let them have some solar panels on their rooves to make them feel loved and important while we whack in the TOU smart meters for some client learnings.
According to Dave Walsh on his GETR energy blog, as of June of this year, 90% of all investment in US new-build power generation capacity is directed towards wind and solar backed by batteries.
Trump’s energy policy is to end the Green New Scam and to move decisively back to gas-fired, coal-fired, and nuclear generation.
But there is a snag. Is it not true that most of the industrial capacity for manufacturing power transmission and distribution systems, coal-fired and gas-fired power generation systems, and the associated ancillary equipment for power generation systems has moved offshore in the last two decades?
And so if there is a sudden and dramatic shift away from the renewables towards constructing gas-fired generation, plus some coal-fired generation, where will all the necessary systems and components come from? China? India? Other offshore nations wherever the industrial capacity happens to be located?
If most of the systems and associated components needed for a quick expansion of gas-fired generation plus some coal-fired generation must be imported, how will the Trump tariffs affect their cost and availability?
There are still US companies making replacement parts for the 200+ coal-powered generating plants in the US. The biggest concern I’ve seen is the potential wait times to get natural gas turbines. They are fabricated in the US, but the demand is exceeding production.
The Australian (15/7/2025)-
Offshore wind developer BlueFloat Energy has abandoned plans for one of Victoria’s most advanced offshore wind projects after failing to secure a buyer, dealing a fresh blow to the state’s ambitious clean-energy transition.
It marks one of the first significant casualties in Australia’s nascent offshore wind sector, which has struggled to overcome investment hurdles despite being central to Victoria’s plan to phase out coal and replace it with renewable energy……
“Following a strategic review of current and anticipated global offshore wind market conditions, BlueFloat Energy’s ultimate shareholder Quantum Capital Group has determined that continuing to fund offshore wind developments is no longer commercially viable in the short and medium term,” the company said in a statement.
The city slicker climate changers were counting on offshoring wind due to all the pesky deplorables getting increasingly upset and loud with all the spaghetti and meatballs trashing the ambience of their environment.
It’s all going swimmingly Down Under with the green consulting jobs-
Gladstone hydrogen project axed: Chris Bowen’s green energy fantasy continues slow sink into the abyss as $12.5 billion plant gets reality check | Sky News Australia
Meanwhile the hopium smokers den have it all figured out-
What’s happened to Australia’s green hydrogen dream? Here are 5 reasons the industry has floundered