The U.S. federal Rural Utility Service (RUS) recently announced that partly as a result of uncertainty over litigation, it will not fund new coal plants in 2008 and 2009. Through the RUS, the federal government has historically provided low-cost financing to rural electricity cooperatives, and has made and guaranteed loans to rural coal-fired power projects. In deciding to suspend funding for new coal-fired power projects, the RUS reversed a decision it had made to process a loan application for a proposed project near Great Falls, Montana. The public interest law firm Earthjustice had filed suit in July 2007 to challenge this proposed financing, citing RUS's failure to consider the global warming implications of the financing. For further information, please see
www.forbes.com/markets/feeds/afx/2008/03/05/afx4731886.html.
