Trump Invokes Defense Production Act for $700 Million Coal Push

President Donald Trump announced a federal investment of approximately $700 million to revitalize the U.S. coal industry on June 4, 2026. Invoking the Defense Production Act of 1950 and declaring a national energy emergency, the administration is repurposing environmental funds to support energy infrastructure. The package allocates $425 million to upgrade 13 existing coal plants across 10 states and roughly $200 million in grants to build the first new U.S. coal plants since 2013 in Alaska and West Virginia, as well as restart a defunct plant in Maryland.

Additional funding of $75 million is designated for the West Gateway Terminal in Oakland, California, a long-delayed export hub designed to send 12 million tons of coal annually to Asian markets. In West Virginia, the company TerraSpark will receive up to $18.5 million to construct a 1.6-gigawatt plant featuring carbon-capture technology. Concurrent actions include an emergency order from the Department of Energy to keep a plant in Orlando, Florida, operational and EPA revisions to prevent the closure of a facility in Wyoming.

Trump claims the initiative will create or support 14,000 jobs and save consumers $50 billion in energy costs, framing coal as an existential necessity to power artificial-intelligence data centers. However, environmental groups including the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Defense Fund condemned the move as a taxpayer-funded bailout for polluters that will increase utility costs and exacerbate climate change.