In a finance world increasingly committing to investing with environmental, social and governance factors as a priority, the coal sector is finding it difficult to find its place. Over the past several years, the industry has seen banks and insurers increasingly pledge to abandon the sector to appease environmental concerns, particularly around climate change. There are 116 globally significant banks and insurers with coal divestment, exclusion or restriction policies in place, Tim Buckley, director of energy finance studies at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, said in a January 17 email. The divestment movement is accelerating and marked a major milestone this month when BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, announced a coal exclusion policy impacting about $500 million of its assets under management. “As Blackrock says, this is the easy one — […]