Campbell plant costs total about $259 million since order

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled unanimously on Friday that the Department of Energy exceeded its authority when it forced the JH Campbell Generating Plant in Ottawa County, Michigan, to remain operational past its planned May 2025 retirement. The ruling is a defeat for the Trump administration’s use of emergency powers to keep aging coal plants online.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright had invoked the Federal Power Act’s emergency authority to keep the 64-year-old coal-fired facility running, saying it was needed to ensure regional electricity reliability. Three states — Michigan, Illinois, and Minnesota — joined environmental groups in court to overturn the orders.

Keeping the plant open beyond its planned retirement has cost about $259 million so far, according to new financial filings cited in the case. Opponents of the order said those losses will probably be paid by families and businesses in the midwest in the form of higher electricity bills.

In the unanimous opinion, Judge Cornelia Pillard wrote that the Federal Power Act’s emergency provision is “essentially a narrow, last-resort backstop.” By reversing the Campbell plant’s “long and carefully planned retirement,” Pillard wrote, “the results are disruptive.” There was no “emergency” within the meaning of the statute, she concluded.

The Michigan case is one of several legal disputes that have emerged across the country as the Trump administration has used emergency powers to force a half-dozen coal-fired plants to remain operational. Similar orders apply to plants in Indiana, Colorado, Florida, and Washington state, and an oil and gas plant in Pennsylvania was also ordered to keep its turbines running as a hedge against electricity shortages in the mid-Atlantic grid. Critics say the orders have raised ratepayer bills and added air and water pollution that could have been avoided.

Ted Kelly, US clean energy director at the Environmental Defense Fund, said the court ruling rejected the Trump administration’s nationwide effort to force “unreliable, ageing coal plants that are bleeding money and polluting communities to stay online.”

The Energy Department’s “unlawful actions attempted to make families and businesses in the midwest wastefully pay hundreds of millions of dollars for a coal plant that should have been shut down over a year ago,” Kelly said Friday. The Campbell plant and other aging sites are “incredibly expensive, dangerous to our health and break down frequently,” he said.

Sanjay Narayan, a lawyer for the Sierra Club, called the ruling a victory for families across the midwest who are “paying to keep this old, expensive and dirty power plant online.” The Trump administration “has been pulling out all the stops to try to bolster dirty and expensive fossil fuels at public expense,” Narayan said. “This reckless agenda will not succeed.”

“We will continue to fight back against the other illegal extensions across the country,” Narayan added.

The Energy Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the ruling.