Green groups to protest Ex-Im over coal project

A coalition of green groups will protest the Export-Import Bank on Wednesday, urging its officials not to finance a project at a coal-powered Australian power plant.

Representatives from the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and the Rainforest Action Network, as well as other groups, will deliver a petition with more than 600,000 signatures urging the bank not to aid the project.

{mosads}At issue is financing for the Abbot Point coal export terminal connected to a mine in Queensland, Australia. Environmentalists say the project would require removing part of the Great Barrier Reef and hurt the local economy.

The timing of protests from progressive groups couldn’t be worse for the embattled bank, whose charter is set to expire June 30.

It faces an uncertain future in Congress, where conservative lawmakers say it benefits well-connected corporations like Boeing at taxpayer expense

The bank’s supporters — nearly all Democrats and many centrist Republicans — argue that it helps sustain millions of small business jobs and opens markets to U.S. goods.

Green groups have long pressured Ex-Im over the environmental impacts of projects it finances.