Wall St.: Cutting Off Big Coal's Baddest?

[bloomington-lib]

Source: Mother Jones

After nearly wrecking the global economy, pocketing trillion-dollar bailouts, and now profiting handsomely while the American economy sputters, it's hard to muster any praise at all for the titans of Wall Street. Some recent developments on the Street, though, do deserve plaudits, however tempered: Over the past two years, many of the world's biggest banks have limited or severed ties with one of the world's most environmentally destructive practices, mountaintop removal mining.

Concentrated in the Appalachian region, MTR mining involves blasting the peaks off mountains to expose the black veins of coal underneath. But the byproduct of MTR is tons of rubble and waste from the demolition that eventually quickly finds its way into nearby rivers, streams, and other water sources, severely contaminating them. As a result, local wildlife is killed off and nearby communities suffer prolonged health issues. And as scientist Margaret Palmer at the University of Maryland's Center for Environmental Science has testified (pdf), there's really no way to mitigate the effects of MTR. For years, the coal companies practicing MTR mining operated thanks to billions in loans from the world's biggest banks, who arranged funding deals to facilitate MTR projects.

But as the Rainforest Action Network (RAN), one of the most active organizations pressuring banks to stop funding MTR, noted on Wednesday, a who's-who of Wall Street firms—Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Credit Suisse, and Morgan Stanley—have passed company policies cutting ties or minimizing their connections with MTR-tied coal companies, like Massey Energy, a major player in the MTR business. Not long after Mother Jones reported in March on megabank JPMorgan Chase's support for MTR—it has helped to underwrite nearly 20 bond or loan deals worth $8.5 trillion; one activist called Chase "the largest remaining player in this game"—the bank announced it planned to further review its MTR financing practices. (And Chase pointed out that it did not finance a single company with a major stake in MTR mining in 2009.)

Looking at MTR financing figures, available here courtesy of the financial watchdog group BankTrack, it's evident that Wall Street's move away from MTR could seriously wound the industry. MTR currently accounts for approximately 7 percent of US coal mining, though that figure could decline if more banks announce MTR policies. Says RAN's Tarbotten, "Bottom-line, as access to capital becomes more constrained it will be harder for mining companies to finance the blowing up of America’s mountains."



Read more: http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/08/wall-street-mountaintop-removal-pnc-rainforest-action-network

[elleng]

1. A Battle in Mining Country Pits Coal Against Wind.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/15/business/energy-environment/15coal.html?_r=1&hp

ALL good news!

[SILVER__FOX52]

2. I find this so bizarre !! Wall street is making a " judgment "

that an industry should no longer be bankrolled. I wish they could commit suicide.

[watajob]

3. Coal prices ...

... must be down. Altruism is not a word on Wall Street.

[loudsue]

4. They need to do the same to natural gas extraction...."fracking" pollutes groundwater

severely and for a LONG time. I hope the group that has put pressure on the banks to stop mountain top removal will weigh in on the insidious fracking procedure for extracting natural gas.

[Hestia]

5. Here here, loudsue! It's destroying the water here and the infrastructure. That's the part

that has the counties, who have been pinching pennies. Don't care where the pressure comes from, just as long as it stops. It's about the only industry paying taxes here.