Ten environmental groups fired off a warning this week to a little-known investment firm bankrolling two of the remaining proposals to export America's coal to Asia: Withdraw financing or face public protest.

The Jan. 27 warning letter to Ross Bhappu, a partner at Resources Capital Funds (RCF), is evidence of a shift in strategy for environmentalists who have long challenged big banks with protests and letter-writing campaigns to stop financing coal and other fossil fuel projects.

Now that Wall Street investors are turning their back on coal export terminals, activists are starting to apply the same scrutiny to smaller companies that are filling the financing gap.

"Our hope is that Bhappu and RCF will take a more common sense approach and withdraw their investments," said Kelly Mitchell, a coal campaigner for Greenpeace, a signatory on the letter. "If not, we're willing to bring more public scrutiny to the company and engage more of our membership on the issue."

RCF, a Colorado-based private equity firm, is a major investor in Ambre Energy. The Australian coal and shale company has two proposed terminals under federal and state environmental review—one each in Oregon and Washington State.

RCF holds about $1 billion in assets and specializes in investing in mining companies and high-risk ventures that yield greater returns.

The firm's involvement "is raising flags for residents, regulators and elected officials about who they are trusting with their natural resources, as well as the health and safety of their communities and environment," Mitchell of Greenpeace said.

Bhappu, who also sits on Ambre's board, did not respond to requests for comment.

Ambre's proposals are two of just three surviving export facilities being considered in the Pacific Northwest. In 2013, two other proposed coal export terminals in Oregon, as well as two in Texas, were shelved as the economics of coal deteriorated and environmental opposition increased, causing investors to flee.



Earlier this month, Wall Street financial giant Goldman Sachs dropped its holding in Carrix, the company behind the third remaining proposed coal terminal in the northwest. Mexican investor Fernando Chico Pardo immediately bought up Goldman's stake, breathing new life into the Washington State project.

In separate reports released recently, Goldman and Citigroup warned, among other things, that demand for America's coal in China is weakening.

If built, the three remaining projects combined would ship as much as 100 million tons of coal to China and elsewhere in Asia annually—ramping up U.S. coal production at a time when industry is facing carbon emissions regulations that would essentially end construction of new coal plants across the country.

"Ambre Energy's coal export proposals present serious risks to the environment and communities in the Pacific Northwest and Interior West," the environmental groups wrote to Bhappu. "But as the controversies around these proposals grow, so will the risks to your investment and your reputation. We urge you to withdraw your investment from Ambre Energy."

The ten groups that sent the letter are: Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Rainforest Action Network, Climate Solutions, Columbia Riverkeeper, Friends of the Columbia Gorge, Northern Plains Resource Council, Oregon Rural Action, WildEarth Guardians and the Western Organization of Resource Councils.

Environmentalists and anti-coal residents oppose the export projects on grounds they would worsen climate change and also cause health and environmental risks from coal dust blowing off trains and boats heading in and out of the terminals. Proponents of the projects say they would create thousands of high-paying construction jobs and boost tax revenues.

In Washington, the Department of Ecology and the Army Corps of Engineers received 209,000 public comments against Ambre Energy's proposed project in recent months.

The environmentalists gave RCF two weeks to reply to their request before taking any actions.

The letter:



&amp;amp;lt;a href="http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1010591/letter-to-resource-capital..."&amp;amp;gt;Letter to Resource Capital Funds (PDF)&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;a href="http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1010591/letter-to-resource-capital..."&amp;amp;gt;Letter to Resource Capital Funds (Text)&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;

&amp;amp;lt;a href="http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1010591/letter-to-resource-capital..."&amp;amp;gt;Letter to Resource Capital Funds (PDF)&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;a href="http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1010591/letter-to-resource-capital..."&amp;amp;gt;Letter to Resource Capital Funds (Text)&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;