Interesting news. Global Financers are refusing to back new coal fueled power plants.
First it was President Barack Obama pledging in June that the government would no longer finance overseas coal plants through the U.S. Export-Import Bank. Next it was the World Bank, then the European Investment Bank, dropping support for coal projects. Those banks have pumped more than $10 billion into such initiatives in the past five years.
“Drawing back means there is less capital for these projects,” Richard Caperton, managing director for energy at the Center for American Progress in Washington, said in an interview. “I don’t expect private capital to move in and fill the void, either, because there is a real risk that these plants will be turned off early.”
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While the pull back is unlikely to have a direct impact on China, the world’s top user of coal, it could curb construction of new plants in countries such as South Africa and Vietnam and dampen new export markets for coal mined in the U.S., Indonesia or Australia by companies such as Peabody Energy Corp. (BTU) and Alpha Natural Resources Inc. (ANR)
“We’ve never seen a cascading sentiment that coal is not acceptable like we’re seeing happen right now,” Justin Guay, the head of the Sierra Club’s international climate program, said in an interview. “It’s a snowball running downhill.”
Bloomberg: Coal at Risk as Global Lenders Drop Financing on Climate
That sounds like good news to me. “It’s a snowball running downhill.”