China & India Dominate Global Coal As Green Nations Divest

Investors in China and India increasingly dominate ownership of coal reserves amid campaigns for divestment in many rich nations to limit the risks from climate change, a study showed on Tuesday. The report identified thousands of shareholders in 117 listed companies producing 3 billion tons a year of thermal coal with 150 billion tons of reserves. It said that ownership of thermal coal, used in power plants, was dominated by “strategic investors in China and India (governments, individuals, power companies, special purpose companies).” Ownership had shifted towards Asia from Europe and North America in recent years, Dylan Tanner, executive director of InfluenceMap, told Reuters. —Reuters, 16 May 2017

Officials and leaders from over 110 countries gathered in Beijing on May 14-15 for the first ever Belt and Road Forum. China’s ambitious attempt to boost economic growth across a vast area stretching from its southeast coast all the way to Africa is known as the Belt and Road Initiative. The Global Environment Institute (GEI) has recently carried out a long-term review of China’s involvement in coal power projects in 65 countries that are now participating in the Belt and Road Initiative. GEI’s figures show that between 2001 and 2016 China was involved in 240 coal power projects in BRI countries, with a total generating capacity of 251 gigawatts. The GEI research also found that China’s involvement in coal power projects in BRI countries, which often takes the form of contracting and equipment supply, has been increasing overall, despite large year-to-year fluctuations. –Feng Hao, China Dialogue, 12 May 2017

Coal will remain India’s main energy source for the next three decades although its share will gradually fall as the country pushes renewable power generation, according to a government report seen by Reuters. “India would like to use its abundant coal reserves as it provides a cheap source of energy and ensures energy security as well,” the report said. —Reuters, 16 May 2017

Energy experts of Germany’s grand coalition of conservatives (CDU/CSU) and Social Democrats (SPD) have rebuffed the Green Party’s plans for an accelerated coal exit. “We cannot phase out both nuclear and coal-fired power production within 15 or 20 years,” conservative Thomas Bareiß said at a party debate hosted by utilities RWE and Innogy. Bareiß argued that exiting coal “with a sledgehammer-approach” would “massively damage” Germany’s industrial capacity and undermine the “basis of our prosperity”. —Clean Energy Wire, 16 May 2017

Theresa May’s “cap” on energy saves £1.4 billion a year; this will be dwarfed by the additional £7.4 billion a year due to be added to our energy bills under the Climate Change Act. –Christopher Booker, The Sunday Telegraph, 14 May 2017

Germany’s Green Party is collapsing and the party could lose all its seats in the national legislature, according to a Monday article in the magazine Der Spiegel. The Greens are polling very poorly in upcoming national elections scheduled for September, and the party doesn’t seem to have a plan to solve the problem, according to Der Spiegel. The magazine notes the party is in ‘existential crisis.’ If the party doesn’t receive at least 5 percent of the vote, it will not have a representative at the federal level. “The Greens are dying in entire regions,” writes Der Spiegel. –Andrew Follett, Daily Caller, 16 May 2017

After 61 days of negotiations, talks to form a new Dutch ruling cabinet fell apart on Monday, according to a press release from Edith Schippers. “It has not worked out; the talks have ended,” Schippers said at the beginning of a press conference announcing the news. Nearly nine weeks after the election, the parties differences were simply too great, she added. Attempts at forming a policy to handle migrants to the Netherlands proved to be the last straw. The parties were also far apart on issues related to climate change, energy sustainability and income she said. —NL Times, 15 May 2017

There is likely to be increasing pressure to reform the gas and electricity regulator, Ofgem, which is widely held to have failed in the protection of consumers. This accusation is to a large degree both misguided and unjust. Ofgem is constrained by its Statutory Duties, which were revised by Ed Milliband in 2010 to put climate policy costs beyond criticism. It is this, as much as institutional lassitude, that accounts for it being so ineffective a consumer champion. –John Constable, GWPF Energy, 16 May 2017