Big European banks face call to end funding for firms building coal-fired plants

* Banks bring in policies to restrict lending to utilities

* NGOs say many banks still indirectly financing coal power

* Politicians meeting at climate summit in Madrid

By Susanna Twidale, Sinead Cruise and Simon Jessop

LONDON, Dec 5 (Reuters) - Some of Europe's biggest banks are
being challenged by environmental groups to sever all lending to
utilities which they say are still developing new coal-fired
power plants.

The call comes as some 190 countries meet in Madrid to
assess progress on the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, which
demands a virtual end to coal power by 2050.

A United Nations report last year said almost all coal-fired
power plants would need to close by the middle of this century
to curb a rise in global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius, in
line with the level scientists say is needed to stave off the
worst effects of climate change.

"Some banks have pledged to not directly finance new coal
plants but they are providing general finance to companies which
are building new plants," Katrin Ganswindt of German
environmental pressure group Urgewald told Reuters.

Urgewald and BankTrack, an NGO focused on banks and the
activities they finance, said an analysis of the 10 most active
European lenders to companies which are still planning or
developing new coal plants indicated total debt funding had
risen to $56 billion between 2017 and the end of September 2019.

This compared with a calculation of $48 billion for the
period 2014 to 2016, the pressure groups said in a report
provided to Reuters on Thursday.

The 10 banks were Barclays, BNP Paribas,
Credit Agricole, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank
, HSBC, ING, Nordea,
Standard Chartered and UniCredit.

Most of those named said the report did not reflect their
efforts to stop funding coal plant development or a commitment
to lowering carbon emissions. Credit Suisse declined to comment.

Britain's Barclays said it no longer provides project
finance to any new coal-fired power plants or expansions of
existing ones and disagreed with some of the data:

"The report misrepresents and does not differentiate cases
where Barclays finances a subsidiary investing in renewable
energy, when its parent company may have other subsidiaries
involved in coal, which have no relationship with Barclays."

BANK ACTION

Since Paris, many European banks have adopted policies such
as cutting lending to firms which rely on coal for a high
percentage of their revenues or pledging to end funding for new
mines.

Last week UniCredit said it would halt all lending for
thermal coal financing by 2023, while BNP Paribas said this
month it would stop financing the thermal coal sector in the
European Union by 2030 and by 2040 worldwide.

Deutsche Bank said that since 2016 it no longer finances
"directly or indirectly the construction of new coal-fired power
plants or new mining projects for the production of steam coal".

Some banks have increased their funding of renewable energy
projects and stepped up engagement with clients to encourage a
faster shift away from coal production and consumption.

"In a majority of cases we know the use of funds and are
able to do our due diligence to make sure the financing is
compatible with our policies, which include no direct financing
for new coal-fired power plants," Standard Chartered said.

Urgewald and BankTrack said their analysis was based on
financial databases and public disclosures of loans obtained by
258 coal power producers and the underwriting of bonds issued by
them, although for some syndicated loans and bond commitments
the analysis had estimated each bank's share.

Dutch bank ING said it did not "recognize the figures
mentioned by Urgewald and the conclusions drawn from them".

"ING supports new clients in the utilities sector only when
their reliance on coal is 10% percent or less and they have a
strategy to reduce their coal percentage to close to zero by
2025," it added.

(Editing by Alexander Smith)