West Virginia to Benefit From Met Coal Provision in OBBBA
West Virginia, the largest producer of metallurgical coal in the nation, is set to benefit from a provision in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that expands a tax credit to include “met” coal production and usage as a “critical mineral” used in advanced manufacturing.
Chris Hamilton, President of the West Virginia Coal Association, said, “The inclusion of metallurgical coal as a critical mineral for advanced manufacturing within the Presidents tax bill is a game changer for West Virginia and the tens of thousands of met miners and mine support jobs throughout our state. We applaud Congress for including this provision in the bill and President Trump for his unwavering push for a rational, domestic energy policy that values coal.”
Chris Hamilton
“Without the met coal our miners produce right here in West Virginia our country would be forced to import this critical ingredient for making the steel that builds, defends, and supports America.”
Hamilton emphasized that West Virginia is the nation's leading met coal producer, accounting for 55% of all the coking coal mined in the United States. West Virginia met coal is relied upon for nearly 65% of coking coal used in domestic steel production in the United States. According to state Commerce officials, metallurgical coal is also West Virginia’s leading state export commodity which is delivered to over 45 destinations around the globe. West Virginia accounts for 60% of all U.S. export metallurgical coal.
According to Dr. John Deskins, the states leading economist, West Virginia's met coal benefits go far beyond the coal industry by helping to sustain over 500,000 steel related jobs across the U.S.
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Coal Used to Make Steel Gets Break in Trump's Tax Bill
Coal used to make steel got a break in the latest version of President Donald Trump's tax bill, a subsidy that could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars over 10 years for a fuel that is mostly exported to countries including China.
In April, Trump signed executive orders that directed Chris Wright, the energy secretary and former fracking CEO, to determine whether metallurgical, or met, coal is a "critical mineral" which he did in May.
In the latest version of Trump's so-called One Big Beautiful Bill that the Senate released over the weekend, met coal can claim an advanced manufacturing production tax credit, available for critical minerals, that would pay 2.5% of costs for the fuel.
Sonia Aggarwal, CEO of Energy Innovation, a non-profit group, called allowing met coal to get the credit insane, as it could harm efforts to move to fuels that are less carbon-intensive.
The subsidy would "send hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to China to subsidize dirty steel," Aggarwal said in a post on X. Robbie Orvis, a director of analysis at Energy Innovation, estimated that the credit could be worth $300 million to met coal producers sending coal to China over ten years and said the subsidy could help China compete with U.S.-made steel.
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Bluefield Coal & Mining Show Returns in September 2025
As coal markets demonstrate renewed strength, the Bluefield Coal & Mining Show returns 10 – 12 September at the Brushfork Armory Civic Center in Bluefield, West Virginia. Hosted by the Chamber of Commerce of the Two Virginias, this premier event brings together key decision-makers from across the mining and energy sectors.
“The outlook for the industry is very positive,” said Bob Ramsey, CEO of Industrial Solutions Group and General Chairman of the show. “This year’s theme, ‘Connecting Buyers & Sellers’, reflects our focus on creating real value for exhibitors and attendees alike.”
Celebrating nearly 50 years, the biennial show draws thousands of visitors from more than 25 coal-producing states and abroad. With more than 20 new exhibitors joining this year’s lineup from throughout the US and Canada, this event focuses solely on the mining industry and intends to bring people from every part of the coal and mining industries to the coal fields of Southern West Virginia.
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US Without Coal? Good Luck
By Frank Clemente and Fred Palmer; Coal is the Cornerstone LLC
First, let’s establish the stark reality of coal’s contribution to American Society during crises over the last decade:
2014 Polar Vortex, brought extreme cold across the US resulting in record winter peak electric demands. Coal provided the majority of electricity but, even more importantly, coal power increased 92% YOY to meet the load. Oil increased 12%, Wind 9% and Nuclear 7%. Natural gas (NG) generation decreased 6% YOY and Hydro declined 15%. Solar was irrelevant. NG was diverted to space heating needs and prices in the Northeast exceeded $100/ MMBtu. New England Utilities resorted to burning jet fuel.
2019 “Cold Event” a severe cold wave caused by an Arctic Polar Vortex hit the East and Midwest leading to fatalities. In the PJM region (65 million people) coal power led all fuels at 37% of electricity. All renewables combined contributed only 7% of electricity. In the MISO region (45 million people), coal provided 50 % of electricity and operated at 73 % of installed capacity.
2021- Winter Storm Uri impacted much of the US. Extreme cold forced the MISO grid, which stretches across 15 states and Manitoba, to make emergency load reduction. Coal-based generation surged 36 percent and met almost 50% of demand. Solar power was virtually non-existent, and MISO reported that “output from wind generation was low throughout the duration of the event”. NG prices increased from less than $3 per MMBTU to as much as $700.
2024 - Winter storm, multiple cold weather fronts moved across the country, setting low-temperature records. Energy Ventures Analysis (EVA) noted that across the three storms, coal-fired power plants showed the most significant increase in utilization rates: “Wind generation faced challenges… while solar generation was entirely or almost entirely absent.” Further, EVA concluded: “Higher shares of solar facilities and fewer dispatchable resources likely would have resulted in widespread power outages “.
Fred Palmer
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Will the Power Keep Flowing?
What a week for congressional attention on grid reliability.
A brutal heatwave is pushing the supply of power to its very limit in grids stretching across much of the country. Outages have already hit parts of New York City, while the PJM Interconnection and Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) grids have both issued “maximum generation alerts” calling on every available power plant to meet peak demand. The Department of Energy also issued an emergency waiver to allow generators in the Southeast to operate at their maximum capacity to preserve reliability. Keeping the lights on and ACs running is taking a tremendous amount of skill and equal amount of luck.
While our supply of power is pushed to its very limit, the House Energy and Commerce committee held a markup on legislation designed to help the electric grid meet soaring power demand. While today’s challenges are daunting, looming on the horizon is extraordinary demand growth. Balancing supply and demand will only get harder from here on out.
The committee marked up 13 bills, which do everything from easing permitting for energy infrastructure to giving federal reliability regulators the authority to intervene if proposed early plant retirements threaten the grid. This package of bills is an important step towards providing the tools needed to better shore up our supply of power and handle the extraordinary demand coming from electrification and the AI data center boom.
The data center industry has made it abundantly clear: its growth is dependent on the availability of reliable, affordable power. And in the AI energy race, the U.S. risks falling far behind China.
As Rich Nolan, the National Mining Association’s president and CEO, wrote to the committee on the markup, “these legislative proposals offer urgently needed solutions to the worsening reliability crisis facing our bulk power system.” He added, pointing to projections of demand overwhelming available supply, “the nation cannot afford to lose more dependable, dispatchable generation.”
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