Credit: www.hullfinancialplanning.com

WEST VIRGINIA IS second only to Wyoming in both coal production and President Trump’s winning vote percentage in the 2016 general election. So it was no surprise that Trump flew to the Mountain State on Tuesday to stump for his new plan to boost coal-fired power plants by cutting regulations on planet-warming carbon emissions.

“We love clean, beautiful West Virginia coal,” Trump told supporters at the Charleston Civic Center, while mocking renewable energy and natural gas, which have displaced coal in electric utilities across the US. “We love [coal],” he said. “You know, it’s indestructible stuff. In times of war, in times of conflict, you can blow up those windmills. They fall down real quick. You can blow up those pipelines real quick. You can do a lot of things to those solar panels, but you know what you can’t hurt, coal. You can do whatever you want to coal.”

Trump’s new power plant proposal—released by the EPA on Tuesday—would give states more leeway in regulating carbon dioxide emissions from power plants, and allow older coal plants to keep […]