No public funding in Adani's coal mine: Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull

KOLKATA: Australian Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull on Friday ruled out any public funding for Adani's proposed $ 21 billion Carmichael coal mine project thereby considerably reducing the company’s chance of sourcing funds for it.

"There's no public funding in Adani's coal mine but just to be very clear about this. We are taking huge reductions in greenhouse gas emissions at the Paris talks. Very big, the second largest per capita reductions in the OECD,” Turnbull said on Friday.

The admission from Australian Prime Minister, Turnbull that Adani's proposed Carmichael coal mine will receive no public money removes one of the final remote funding options for the beleaguered project, according to the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).

According to IEEFA, Adani Enterprises remains relatively heavily geared, with net debt of $2.6 billion representing 1.3 times book value of shareholders’ equity.

The accounts book of Adani for 2015 suggests, Adani Mining Australia Pty Ltd is entirely debt funded and is currently operating with negative shareholder funds. Financial leverage remains an insurmountable barrier to progressing the Carmichael coal proposal in the Galilee.”

"Adani appears to have no capacity to undertake the high risk Australian $10 billion Carmichael coal proposal, particularly since the company is now well underway on its new $5-10 billion solar investment program," said Tim Buckley, director of Energy Finance Studies at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.
In the recent past a host of international funding entities as well as State Bank of India have refused to fund the project as part of their policy to reduce funding in projects that add to greenhouse effects.