“Whitehaven Coal has done the near impossible,” said Greenpeace Climate & Energy campaigner, Nic Clyde. “They have managed to so alienate local farmers, the Traditional Owners of the Leard State Forest, large environmental groups, religious leaders, doctors and war veterans that an historic alliance is now working together to oppose the company and its product – coal.”
The report finds in an already difficult investment conditions, WHC faces four specific disadvantages:
1. WHC lacks a social licence to operate, guaranteeing ongoing opposition
2. WHC has become a focus of the national and global fossil fuel divestment campaign
3. WHC is a pure play coal company, with zero diversification to insulate against the structural decline of coal
4. The company’s green field Maules Creek mine is the largest new open cut coal mine currently under construction in Australia. In a carbon-constrained world the commercial risk for WHC is that established mines, with infrastructure close to ports and end use power plants, will have a competitive claim on markets.
“The fact that WHC’s CEO, Paul Flynn, refers to the divestment movement as ’green imperialism’ shows how little the company understands the situation it is in,” said 350.org CEO, Blair Palese. “The global divestment movement is highlighting the risks posed by a business-as-usual approach to the consumption of fossil fuels and of course the worst behaved companies fit that frame better than any others,” concluded Palese.
“Climate change is an essentially moral issue so it’s no great leap of the imagination to see why religious people are taking stand,” said Thea Ormerod, head of the Australian Religious Response to Climate Change.
“WHC’s treatment of local farming community, the Traditional Owners and the way the company has sought to get away with clearing in winter, speaks volumes about its attitude to the community. Is it any wonder large sections of the community have withdrawn their support for such a destructive company,” concluded Ormerod.
“An open cut mine is hardly a fly-by-night proposition,” said Clyde. “And opposition to this mine and the company will continue into the foreseeable future. Investors have every right to feel deeply disappointed in this controversial company.”
On 2 November, 2014 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will release its Synthesis Report of the findings of its Fifth Assessment Report. The IPCC report will warn that “continued emission of greenhouse gases will cause further warming and long-lasting changes in all components of the climate system, increasing the likelihood of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts for people and ecosystems.” It is this global dynamic that WHC needs to deal with.
The report, Whitehaven Coal: No Future is available here.
For further information contact:
Greenpeace Climate & Energy campaigner, Nic Clyde: 0438 282 409
CEO 350.org, Blair Palese: 0414 659 511
ARRCC, Thea Ormerod: 0407 526 342
Greenpeace media officer, Julie Macken: 0400 925 217