One of the saddest parts of Obama’s War on Coal is the retirement of really old coal fired power plants. In 2008, there were 10 operating  coal fired units that cranked out their first electrons between 1920 and 1929, including a unit that first was fired up during Calvin Coolidge’s Presidency in 1921. 

Sadly though as of 2015, only one coal fired generating unit from the roaring twenties is still operational in America. That unit is a 2,500 Kw cogeneration unit at American Eagle Paper Mills in a Blair, Pennsylvania. That unit burns coal, as it has for 88 years to make stream and electricity. 

Back in 2008, five out of ten coal fired generating units were built prior to 1966. Thanks to Barack Obama’s War on Coal, the median age of coal generating units by 2015 was 43 years old. 50% of all coal fired power plants in 2015 were built prior to 1972. A lot of World War II era and 1950s power plants have been retired in the meantime. Kind of sad for those of us who loved those grandfatherly, dirty old plants.