“Today marks the beginning of the end of Big Coal’s dominance over America’s energy future.  KKR and Texas Pacific Group have validated the concerns of RAN and other environmentalists, along with a broad coalition of political and business leaders, who have targeted TXU in recent months over its proposal to build 11 new coal-fired power plants that would emit 78 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year.

“Twenty months ago, many of the nation’s political and business leaders were marching behind the Bush energy plan, a lockstep that resulted in proposals to build more than 150 new coal-fired power plants. Investment banks on Wall Street facilitated these proposals by committing billions of dollars for dirty coal plants that would burden the country with outdated technologies and unprecedented growth in greenhouse gas emissions for generations to come.

“The pledge by TXU’s new owners reflects an emerging economic and political reality: any further investment in dirty, inefficient coal plants is risky business. Horrified by Hurricane Katrina, motivated by An Inconvenient Truth, and inspired to create a clean energy future, Americans are convincing policymakers and business executives to reject outdated coal power plants and reinvest in efficiency and clean renewable energy.

“Let’s finish the job. It’s time for the financial industry to prohibit any further investments in new coal plants and infrastructure, and for Congress to mandate emissions reductions and offer incentives that would allow American ingenuity to help create a 21st-century energy plan that will make us proud. The commitments by TXU’s new owners should be binding, not voluntary, and the three Texas coal plants TXU still intends to build are three plants too many. In Texas and across the country, we can meet our energy needs more quickly, more cheaply, and more cleanly through investments in wind and solar power and energy efficiency. We are counting on Wall Street to step up to the plate and start funding the future.”

- Michael Brune
Executive Director

In mid-December 2006, RAN issued formal letters to 56 financial institutions, including the lead arrangers of the TXU coal plant project – Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and Citigroup – asking them to withhold financing for TXU’s new coal plants. To date, 20 banks around the world have responded saying they would not fund the TXU project. In recent weeks, RAN has organized several high-profile demonstrations at Merrill Lynch branches around the United States, calling on the investment bank to withhold funding from TXU.

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