Things haven't been going well lately for climate activists in energy-pariah Australia. Writing in the new Sierra ("Great Barrier Reef Madness"), Serena Renner details that country's latest disastrous coal-export scheme: 

In August, the state of Queensland, Australia, approved a railroad linking coal mines in its Galilee Basin to the Abbot Point port. It's the latest lost battle for environmentalists fighting Queensland's large-scale plan to expand its coal industry with new mines and bigger export terminals. If the development is fully realized, five major port expansions will accommodate 3,000 new freight and cruise ships per year, and millions of tons of sediment dredged to expand the ports could be dumped inside the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. 

What made this project notorious--in addition to its massive contribution to global warming--was its initial plan to dump dredging sediment from the port expansion into the Great Barrier Marine Park. 

Following a spate of public outrage, as well as two court cases challenging dredging and dumping—one of them supported by the $6 billion tourism industry—the decision was overturned, though the government refused to permanently ban dumping dredge spoils in the marine park.

But now it looks like the project may be in serious trouble. After a lobbying campaign by the Rainforest Action Network, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan Chase have all declined to invest in the project. The move follows similar actions from Deutsche Bank, the Royal Bank of Scotland, HSBC, Barclays, and Credit Agricole. According to the Australian Sydney Morning Herald, the project's future viability now depends on obtaining financing from Australian banks. While they may not share the environmental scruples of U.S. and European banks, their due diligence cannot help but note that prices for Australian coal have fallen by nearly half in the past four years.