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<\/p>\nNew legislation would require a full environmental impact report ahead of coal operations in the state. The policy rebukes White House plans to put a $75 million coal project in the East Bay. <\/p>\n
Jun 15, 2026<\/p>\n
Updated 3:07 pm PT<\/p>\n
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A train loaded with coal approaches the Levin-Richmond Terminal in Richmond, California, on July 23, 2015. A similar plan for a coal exporting operation has been proposed at the old Oakland Army Base by Oakland developer Phil Tagami and a company called Terminal Logistics Solutions. Residents and environmental justice advocates say the terminal would worsen air quality in West Oakland, which is already overburdened.\u00a0(Carlos Avila Gonzalez\/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)<\/p>\n
\u201cThe beautiful people of West Oakland, Alameda, and Emeryville have fought for clean air, for their children\u2019s health, and for their right to breathe for generations,\u201d Bonta said in a statement Monday. \u201cDonald Trump used a Cold War emergency law to try to override all of that. He will not succeed.\u201d<\/p>\n
On June 4, Trump announced that he would direct the hundreds of millions of dollars toward keeping ailing coal facilities open, creating two new coal plants in Alaska and West Virginia, and constructing the Oakland export terminal.<\/p>\n
After the Oakland Army Base closed in 1999, East Bay developer Phil Tagami planned to open a bulk export facility on a portion of the site . Though initially, he said the terminal would not handle coal, in 2015, plans to partner with Utah <\/a>and allow up to 10 million tons of the state\u2019s coal to be sent through the facility became public, prompting widespread outrage from Oaklanders.<\/p>\n Residents and environmental justice advocates say the terminal would worsen air quality in West Oakland, which already suffers from some of the highest asthma-related emergency room visit and hospitalization rates<\/a> in the country due to pollution from highways and industrial operations.<\/p>\n They worry that coal dust from uncovered trains travelling through the city could add to that burden. According to Bonta, the terminal\u00a0 would have the capacity to export up to 10 million short tons of coal annually \u2014 which equates to multiple trains-worth a day arriving in West Oakland through the East Bay.<\/p>\n \u201cShipping coal through Oakland would exacerbate the real emergencies of global warming and public health in vulnerable communities along the Union Pacific tracks that would bring the coal to Oakland,\u201d No Coal in Oakland, a coalition that\u2019s been organizing in opposition to the project for the more than a decade, said in a statement following Trump\u2019s announcement. \u201cIf the terminal is built, coal dust and diesel exhaust will spew from multiple mile-long coal trains passing through our communities each day.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2016, the city council passed a ban on handling or exporting coal<\/a> in Oakland. Though Tagami sued, city officials and local environmental justice groups have stalled the project for a decade, as multiple legal challenges played out in court.<\/p>\n Last year, the state supreme court declined to take up the case. That leaves funding as one of the last major hurdles to building the terminal. Coal-producing states now hope the Trump administration\u2019s funding infusion could be the key to finally bringing the Oakland facility to fruition.<\/p>\n Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, who joined the president during his June 4 announcement, said Taiwan and Japan have recently decided to reinvest in coal as a \u201creliable, dispatchable, secure source of energy,\u201d which can be extracted\u00a0 from the coal mines in the Powder River Basin, a 20,000 square mile stretch of coal-rich land in southeast Montana and northeast Wyoming.<\/p>\n \u201cTo be able to open that Oakland port is absolutely essential for the lifeblood of our state and for our coal mines,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n For decades, the U.S.\u2019s coal industry has been largely locked out of the West Coast \u2014 as\u00a0 liberal states have rejected projects that could be used to transfer fuel from coal producers to Asia. The American coal industry had also waned, eclipsed by less expensive natural gas and renewable energy, before the Trump administration announced it would focus on \u201creinvigorating America\u2019s beautiful, clean coal industry<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n The funds Trump has proposed for the Oakland terminal and other coal industry investments were originally to be used for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from polluting industries.<\/p>\n He\u2019s invoked the Defense Production Act, a war-time law that gives the president broad emergency powers to support domestic industries needed to maintain domestic security, saying that the U.S. faces a national energy emergency<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-2231342596.jpg\")
Democratic Assemblymember Mia Bonta speaks during a meeting of the California State Assembly at the California State Capitol on Aug. 21, 2025, in Sacramento, California. (Justin Sullivan via Getty Images)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-1356445057.jpg\")
The maze and part of the old Oakland Army Base are seen from this drone view in West Oakland, California, on Tuesday, Nov. 23, 2021. (Jane Tyska\/Digital First Media\/East Bay Times via Getty Images)<\/p>\n