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The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service has not funded loans for coal-fired power plants, or any other type of baseload generation, in more than a year, and the administrator of that program does not expect the agency to finance any until late 2009 at the earliest.
An RUS spokesman said the current funding situation is not because of any shift against coal. However, Abigail Dillen, an attorney with the environmental advocacy group Earthjustice, said, "We have a de facto moratorium on funding of any new coal plants."
The lack of federal funding for coal projects sponsored by rural cooperatives is not the result of any congressional inquiry or litigation by environmental groups, USDA and Rural Utilities Service spokesman Jay Fletcher said March 5. The RUS is part of the Department of Agriculture.
The dearth of funding stems from an Office of Management and Budget directive not to fund any new baseload generation, "primarily due to the exceedingly high cost of these plants," Fletcher said....