Greenhouse gas emissions in the United States decreased in 2017 with the closure of coal-fired plants

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Greenhouse gas emissions from America's largest industrial facilities fell by 2.7 percent in 2017, the Trump administration announced, with the closure of coal-fired power plants and competition inexpensive natural gas and less polluting solar and wind energy.

The decline was more pronounced than in 2016, when emissions had dropped by 2%, said the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

EPA Acting Administrator, Andrew Wheeler, said the data proved that federal regulation was not necessary to promote carbon dioxide reductions.

"Thanks to President Trump's regulatory reform program, the economy is booming, energy production is increasing, and we are reducing greenhouse gas emissions from major industrial sources," he said. Wheeler said in a statement.

Although Mr Wheeler granted credits to the administration for the reductions, which came mainly from the electricity sector, the figures also show that the administration was not able to curb the rapid pace of closures of coal-fired power plants.

Voters from states that produce and burn coal are a big part of President Donald Trump's base, but the administration has not been able to chart a way to subsidize the aging of coal and nuclear power plants, although the industrialists asked the administration to act.

Trump said the climate was changing, but he did not know how much the man was causing it. Last year, he announced his intention to pull the country out of the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

Natural gas releases much less carbon dioxide than coal during its combustion, and the national abundance of gas has led to a wave of coal plant closures. In 2017, utilities closed or converted coal to gas from nearly 9,000 megawatts (MW) of coal-fired plants.

Secretary of Energy, Rick Perry, presented several months ago to the White House a plan to subsidize power plants with the help of tools to help the industry when national security is threatened.

By the end of September, Perry had told reporters that his agency's ideas were still "debated" at the White House. An article in Politico this week revealed that White House officials had put the plan on the shelf, asking who would pay the subsidies.

A coalition of natural gas drillers, consumer advocates, grid operators and renewable energy interests has opposed the subsidization of aging coal and nuclear power plants.

The trend of US coal plant closures is expected to intensify this year as utilities are scheduled to close 14,000 MW of coal power plants in the 2018 calendar year.