Coal plants cut in TXU buy-out plan

Australian Financial
Monday 26/2/2007 Page: 10

Under a proposed billion-dollar buy-out by a team of private equity firms, TXU Corp will abandon plans to build eight of 11 coal plants and commit to a range of environmental measures, after the equity firms asked two prominent environmental groups what could be done to secure their support. Goldman Sachs, an adviser and lender to the group, helped negotiate peace with environmental groups and sought their support for the deal.

Goldman Sachs has been one of Wall Street's most progressive firms on climate changes, sending its bankers home in hybrid-powered limousines. Bringing the environmental groups into the process could help avoid years of litigation over emissions, but may also spur questions about how the energy needs originally to be met by the coal plants will be addressed.