Comment by tzs

They are building coal for things that cannot yet be handled by renewables because coal is the fossil fuel natural resource they have the most of.

It's the same reason it was the dominant fossil fuel for electricity in the US until the shale revolution made natural gas cheap and abundant.

The reasons Trump is a schmuck for pushing coal are (1) he wants it instead of renewals rather than as a way to help fill the gap between renewables and what we need until we can build enough renewables and storage, and (2) in the US that makes no sense because because natural gas can fulfill that role and is better in pretty much every way that coal.

Compare to China which is putting vast amounts of resources into building renewables, storage, and also a nationwide UHV distribution network (currently 40-50000 km compared to ~0 in the US) which means local variations in solar/wind can increasingly be covered by non-local renewables, which should reduce the need to fire up those new local coal plants.