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The president’s energy policies create an unprecedented divide: “With its proposal for new payments to support coal-fired and nuclear power plants, the Trump administration has for the first time driven a wedge between the U.S. gas and coal industries.”

A unanimous vote by the Board of Alderman makes St. Louis the 47th American city to formally distance itself from coal-fired electricity. The news is of note in part because St. Louis “has long been the corporate home of many of the nation's largest coal companies, including the industry's two giants, Peabody Energy and Arch Coal.”

Three towns in Harlan County are exploring the possibility of merging into a single municipality as the area copes with the effects of having lost more than half its coal jobs since 2011. “It takes a lot of strong leadership to even have the discussion,” says a representative of the Kentucky League of Cities.

Two members of Congress are proposing expanding an important gas-and-oil tax-break mechanism to the solar and wind industries. The mechanism, called a master limited partnership, or MLP, is “one of biggest boons for the oil-and-gas sector,”allowing companies “to lighten their tax loads and get easier access to investment in pipelines and other projects.”

Based on interviews with residents of Virginia, Kentucky and West Virginia, researchers at Indiana University have published a paper concluding that people who live and work in the region do not expect a coal-industry resurgence and that “current efforts to revive the coal industry will likely do more harm than good to fragile Appalachian communities transitioning from coal as a major source of employment.”

The challenges facing Colstrip, Mont., are a microcosm of those seen in similar communities nationally: “Coal states across the country face a similar future, and while heel-dragging may help coal company owners maximize their profit in the short-term, it does nothing for coal miners and their families.”

Demand for solar- and wind-energy technicians is expected to double over the next decade, according to the latest employment-projection trends from the Labor Department.

In a settlement with parties that include the Florida Industrial Power Users Group and the Florida Retail Federation, Duke Energy Florida says it will invest more in “grid modernization, smart meters, solar, electric vehicle charging stations, battery storage and new programs to enhance customer choices.” The utility has about 1.8 million customers.

Dominion Virginia Power, a major mid-Atlantic electricity provider, is among “many utilities (that) have already shifted away from coal in favor of clean-burning natural gas.” Dominion has also invested $1 billion in solar energy.

Energy Secretary Rick Perry’s plan to prop up the coal industry “is the opposite of a traditional conservative approach … piling another handout on top of the existing, convoluted edifice of subsidies and regulations that define, and distort, the U.S. energy market.”