Trump uses wartime powers to dole out $700m to ‘clean, beautiful’ coal

US president announces plans for two new coal plants, in Alaska and West Virginia, using Defense Production Act

Donald Trump is using wartime presidential authority to hand $700m to coal-fired power plants in the US, the latest move by the president to bolster what he called “clean, beautiful coal”, despite it being the dirtiest of fossil fuels.

“Today, we’re taking historic action to bring down the price of energy and the cost of living for all Americans with the power of clean, beautiful coal,” he said at a press conference on Thursday.

Trump is using the Defense Production Act, a cold war-era statute used to accelerate American industrial output in times of national need, to provide grants to more than a dozen existing coal plants across the US, including facilities capable of exporting coal.

“As a result of the $700m investment that I’m announcing today, we will protect 14 coal plants and 42 coalmines, a tremendous number, and build two new coal plants and one massive new export terminal,” Trump said.

The funds will be used to bring a new coal export terminal online in Oakland, California, and to restart an existing facility in Maryland.

They will also keep online plants across 10 states: West Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, Indiana, Tennessee, Arkansas, Arizona, Oklahoma, North Dakota and Wisconsin. Each of those 10 states voted for Trump, the president boasted on Thursday. “We won them all,” he said.

Trump has long been a champion of reviving the US’s ailing coal industry. Thursday’s White House event featured supportive governors and lawmakers from coal-rich states such as Wyoming and West Virginia.