Coal still provides 33% of global electricity and remains central to industries like steel, cement, and fertiliser. In 2024 alone, commercial banks invested more than US$130 billion in coal projects.
Yet despite this demand, coal is excluded or unfairly treated in many policy and investment frameworks. This approach overlooks both its critical role in powering economies and its ability to cut emissions when paired with modern technologies.
About the Campaign
Fund Fair. Fund Equal. is FutureCoal’s global campaign to change that. Led by CEO Michelle Manook and Chairman Mike Teke, it is built around their open letter to more than 700 global finance, government, and insurance stakeholders. Their message is clear: if the world is going to keep using coal — and all evidence shows it will — the priority must be to make it cleaner, more efficient, and more sustainable.
The way forward is not to abandon coal, but to transform it. FutureCoal’s Sustainable Coal Stewardship (SCS) framework provides the roadmap. Proven technologies can cut emissions by up to 99% and unlock new markets for high-value products such as critical minerals, graphene, and carbon fibre. This approach drives modernisation and responsible investment, ensuring greater economic and environmental returns from every tonne of coal.
Around the world, progress is already underway. China is building the world’s largest coal-based CCUS plant, Japan is pioneering ammonia co-firing, India is scaling coal gasification, and South Africa is pursuing its own fleet modernisation. These projects prove that, with the right investment, coal can deliver both economic growth and environmental progress.
For an inclusive, pragmatic, and sustainable energy transition, coal must be funded fairly and equally.
Michelle Manook’s Open Letter
FutureCoal CEO Michelle Manook wrote to more than 700 global banks, investors, insurers, and governments with a clear message: financial decisions must be pragmatic, not ideological.
Her letter challenges the binary approach of supporting metallurgical coal while excluding thermal, despite thermal coal providing 35% of global electricity in 2024. She outlines FutureCoal’s Sustainable Coal Stewardship (SCS) framework, which uses proven technologies to cut emissions by up to 99% and create new markets for products like hydrogen, carbon fibre, and graphene.
Michelle calls on financial leaders to adopt long-term strategies that recognise coal’s evolving role in energy security, affordability, and industrial resilience.
Mike Teke’s Open Letter
FutureCoal Chairman Mike Teke reinforced this message with his own letter to global financial stakeholders. Writing as a mining leader from South Africa, he urged institutions to fund both metallurgical and responsibly stewarded thermal coal fairly and equally.
He emphasised that coal remains the world’s largest single source of electricity (33%) and attracted more than US$130 billion in bank investment in 2024. Excluding coal, he argued, ignores its role in steel, cement, fertiliser, and power generation, and its potential to cut emissions when paired with modern technologies.
Mike highlighted the SCS framework as the pathway for responsible investment and pointed to innovations in China, India, Japan, South Africa, and the US as proof that coal can deliver both economic growth and environmental progress.