U.S. Treasury Announces Plan To Eliminate Funding For Overseas Coal Plants

Taking a step President Obama promised in his Climate Action Plan unveiled last June, the U.S. Treasury Department issued guidance yesterday that will eliminate U.S. funding to multilateral development banks (MDBs) for new coal-fired power plants overseas, except for projects (i) where carbon capture and sequestration technology is employed or (ii) sited in certain least- developed countries using high-efficiency coal combustion technologies.

The United States has the largest share of donor nation votes in the World Bank, which has a long history of providing funds for nations to develop energy generation technologies. Earlier this year, the World Bank signaled its intention to move away from funding coal-fired facilities and promote the elimination of fossil fuel subsidies worldwide.