Methodology

GCEL includes companies that are developing new coal power, coal mining and/or coal infrastructure projects. The following companies fulfill the expansion criteria:

• Power: Companies planning to develop new coal-fired power capacity of at least 100 MW.
• Mining: Companies engaged in coal exploration activities, planning to develop new coal mines, extending their coal mines or the life of coal mines by applying for new permits.
• Services: Companies involved in the development or expansion of coal transportation assets or other coal-related infrastructure such as coal-to-gas facilities.

All companies that have a coal share of revenue or a coal share of power production of 10% or more are listed on GCEL.

The coal share of revenue (csr) measures the share of a company’s coal-related business with regard to its total revenue. Wherever possible, GCEL differentiates between business activities related to thermal and metallurgical coal.

Coal-related revenue includes the coal mining and power business as well as coal services like exploration, processing, trading, transport & logistics, equipment manufacturing, coal-related maintenance and engineering services, coal-to-liquids and coal-to-gas production. 

For utilities, we calculate the coal share of power production (cspp) based on annual coal power generation or installed capacity.

GCEL includes all companies that have an annual thermal coal production of ≥10 million tons or that have an installed coal-fired capacity of ≥5GW.

These criteria are based on the absolute size of a company’s coal operations. They ensure that all of the world’s largest coal players are featured on GCEL, even if they do not meet our relative criteria. This is important because some of the world’s largest coal miners and coal plant operators are diversified companies. Their coal share of revenue may be below 10%, but this doesn’t make their activities less harmful.