The Pentagon’s Coal Contract Will Be Just Another Bailout
Power play.
Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg
When politicians struggle to explain some action, they often reach for the catch-all of “national security.” The Trump administration has now taken this a step further in its ongoing campaign to revive the US coal industry: Getting the Pentagon to pay for it. And by “the Pentagon,” I mean you and me.
President Donald Trump issued an executive order on Wednesday directing the Defense Department to sign power purchase contracts with coal-fired power plants. In addition, the Energy Department will distribute $175 million to upgrade several coal plants. Meanwhile, the increasingly misnamed Environmental Protection Agency is ramping up efforts to overturn the legal foundation obliging it to regulate carbon dioxide emissions as a pollutant. Just before Trump signed his order to the DoD, grateful coal lobbyists attending the ceremony honored him with an award for being the “Undisputed Champion of Beautiful, Clean Coal.”