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January 4, 2024 - More than 67 organizations are calling on the world’s largest banks to end financial support for new metallurgical coal production and expansion. Led by BankTrack and Reclaim Finance, an open letter was sent to 50 banks asking them to end “business as usual” practices. Metallurgical coal represents 14 percent of the world’s coal and is predominately used for steelmaking in which it’s refined into coke, “a material combined with iron ore in a blast furnace to produce primary steel,” according to the Sierra Club. “The green steel transition is already underway, but financial institutions continue to invest in metallurgical coal—a dead end for the global steel industry and for the climate,” Julia Hovenier, Banks and Steel campaigner at BankTrack, said. “To prevent stranded assets and avoid deepening the climate emergency with their dollars, banks must swiftly adopt policies that halt the expansion of metallurgical coal.” While many financial institutions have adopted policies against thermal coal, only nine have policies against metallurgical coal, the Sierra Club reported. From 2016 to today financial support from the world’s biggest banks in a sum of $557 billion was given to the 50 biggest developers in the metallurgical coal sector. The International Energy Agency said in 2021 that “existing mines were sufficient to meet coking coal demand through 2050,” but there are current plans to up production to capacities of 406 Mt per year, which is more than a third of total consumption in 2021, the Sierra Club reported. “Coal is by far the greatest source of greenhouse gas emissions causing the climate crisis, The open letter specifically calls on banks to:
“We thank you in advance for your bank?s willingness to put an end to the use of all coal and for To read the open letter click here. |
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