Australia keeps voting for coal, but investors are quietly abandoning plans for new mines

What happens when an industry wins political support, but loses private sector money? In Australia, we’re getting a slow lesson in what that looks like. Why does it matter in North Dakota? Because it’s all playing out in energy and coal markets and there’s speculation that new energy investments in the Pacific rim are increasingly influenced by environmental interests.

Is this a trend — the focus away from coal-fired energy — we’ll see in North Dakota? Time will tell, but early signs out of Minnesota suggest similar attitudes are taking root nearby.