A unanimous three-judge panel from the DC Circuit Court of Appeals has voided the Department of Energy's emergency declaration keeping the J.H. Campbell coal-fired power plant in Michigan open. The ruling could invalidate all 55+ similar emergency orders the administration has issued in 2026.
The court found the DOE could not provide any evidence of a critical supply shortage. The plant's closure had been carefully planned through Michigan's utility commission and approved by MISO, the regional grid operator. The DOE offered only a report about low generating reserves and a slide deck about seasonal demand.
The judges interpreted the Federal Power Act as intending federal intervention at the generation level to be rare and only in cases of immediate shortfall. Indeterminate assertions of summer electricity shortfalls are not what Congress meant by emergency, the court concluded.
The ruling is significant because it applies to every coal plant closure blocked by the DOE under the same authority. The DOE has issued over 55 emergency orders in 2026 alone, more than double the total between 2000 and 2025.
