Overview:
The fight over Stanton Unit 1 illustrates how America's AI boom could prolong coal pollution that has historically fallen hardest on Black communities.
For decades, research has shown that Black Americans are more likely than other groups to breathe the pollution produced by coal-fired power plants — a burden measured in higher rates of asthma, heart disease and other illnesses linked to dirty air.
Now, as the nation’s appetite for electricity surges to power artificial intelligence and massive data centers, the Trump administration is breathing new life into aging coal plants that many utilities had already planned to retire.
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One of them is Stanton Unit 1 outside Orlando, where Earthjustice and its allies are challenging a federal order that keeps the nearly 40-year-old plant operating.
Keeping Coal Alive
While there is no evidence that Stanton itself disproportionately exposes Orlando’s Black neighborhoods compared with surrounding communities, its continued operation reflects a broader environmental justice reality: extending the life of coal means prolonging the health burdens that Black Americans have disproportionately carried for generations.
In the 1980s, when Stanton first came online, it and other coal-fired power plants generated more than half of the nation’s electricity. But the Trump Administration has delayed the retirement of Stanton Unit 1 power plant and similar coal-burning facilities that are slated to be retired.
A 2012 NAACP report found that, while 56% of white people lived within 30 miles of a coal-fired power plant, almost 8 in 10 Black Americans did.
Critics say the White House is doing everything that it can to keep coal alive, despite the harm to Black communities. Today, coal is on the way out across the United States, with nearly 300 plants closing between 2010 and 2019, and some 200 that remain supplying a mere 15% of the country’s electricity.
Expensive Energy Source
Last month, Trump’s Department of Energy issued an emergency order to keep Stanton Unit 1 up and running and burning coal.
Florida Rising, local environmental justice organization, is now challenging that order with the support of the Environmental Defense Fund, Sierra Club and Earthjustice.
While the Trump Administration is making the case that Stanton Unit 1 is critical to meeting local energy demands, the environmental coalition points out that the Orlando Utilities Commission calls coal-fueled plants its most expensive source of energy.
Stanton Unit 1, which would have replaced coal with solar and natural gas after its retirement, costs $6.2 million per month to keep running, adding an estimated $20 per month to consumers’ utility bills. At the same time, the pollution from the coal-fired plant contributes to as many as 45 premature deaths every year.
“Florida Rising has been pushing for energy justice throughout Florida by fighting against excessive utility profits and for a just transition that puts frontline communities at the center of energy policy,” Braidley Marshall, a senior attorney at Earthjustice, said in a statement.
“We already have some of the highest electric bills in the nation due to our excess electricity generation capacity,” he said. “So, ordering OUC to keep this uneconomic plant online will just push OUC bills higher at a time when people are already struggling to pay their bills.”
A Just Transition
While the number of people who live near a coal-fired power plant is rapidly declining nationwide, Orlando, which is about 23% Black, looks a lot like the communities that used to share air with these major pollution sources.
A landmark NAACP report published in 2012 found that, while 56% of white people lived within 30 miles of a coal-fired power plant, the percentage of Black Americans who did jumped to almost 8 in 10. At the time, there were still 378 coal-fired plants across the country, supplying more than 40% of the nation’s domestic electricity.
The DOE order will keep Stanton Unit 1 in operation for another 90 days past its planned retirement at the end of May; it may be renewed after the order expires. The Trump Administration has issued similar orders, which Earthjustice and the other groups representing Florida Rising say are illegal, to keep five other coal-fired plants in operation, too.
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Still, there’s no denying that the writing is on the wall for coal.
“Forcing this coal plant to stay open delivers a rate hike to Central Florida families and businesses, right as they are already struggling with sky-high electricity bills,” Adam Kurland, an attorney for the Environmental Defense Fund, said in a statement. “Cheaper, cleaner, and more reliable options had rendered this coal plant obsolete and on track for retirement.”
