Trump's coal plan mixes new market and old hurdles

President Trump couldn't really alter coal's path his first time around, but officials are trying new approaches in 2025 — and the landscape has changed, too.

Why it matters: The expanding federal push to boost mining and power has implications for CO2, traditional air pollution, and power markets amid rising demand.

Catch up quick: Monday brought multi-agency moves to bolster production and generation.

• The Interior Department vowed to open another 13.1 million acres of federal lands for leasing — and at lower royalty rates.
• There's $625 million in DOE funding aimed largely at helping keep existing plants running.
• The EPA offered fresh plans to ease regulations, such as extended time to comply with wastewater rules and changes to regional haze policies.

The big picture: Coal has slid to roughly 16% of the U.S. electricity mix, compared to over half in 2000.

• Lower-cost gas, pollution regulations, and renewables' rise eroded the dominance of the most CO2-heavy fuel.
• But in recent years, power companies have been pushing back plant closures as consumption increases are slated to continue.

Reality check: "It's going to be very difficult for it to work given how much inexpensive, stranded gas there is all over the U.S.," said Ira Joseph, a power analyst with Columbia's Center on Global Energy Policy.

• "Even if the price of gas goes up, it's still pretty competitive relative to coal," he said.

Yes, but: He noted that Trump's policies could help slow the decline. One wild card is just how aggressively the White House might be willing to spend money to help coal.

• He also pointed to the White House taking direct stakes in companies such as chip maker Intel.

State of play: The market and strategies are different than they were in Trump's first term.

• Back then, power demand was static, but now AI and other drivers are pushing it upward.

• Beyond the latest moves, EPA is paring back many air pollution rules, while DOE has been ordering some generation to keep running beyond its scheduled retirement.
• And EPA plans to remove the "endangerment finding" on greenhouse gases, which could complicate a subsequent president's CO2 proposals.

What they're saying: Trump officials are offering a more sweeping pro-coal rationale this time, TD Cowen analysts said in a note, contrasting it to Trump 1.0's reliability focus.

• This heralds tougher policies to keep plants running — which may include interventions that haven't arrived yet.
• "We believe the AI-linked economic and national security arguments empower Trump 2.0 to take bigger swings if coal-fired retirements do not fall to targeted levels," TD Cowen said.

What we're watching: Another wild card is nuclear.

• Tech giants and power companies are interested in small new designs and even new gigawatt-scale units.
• But a new Bloomberg Intelligence report projects that new U.S. nuclear plants won't start coming online until the mid-2030s. That could buy some time for coal.

Cover photo:  Photo illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios. Photo: Patrick van Katwijk/Getty Images