Peabody Energy Corp. is set to pay President Barack Obama’s Harvard Law School mentor $435 000 this year to help the bankrupt coal producer challenge the administration’s signature environmental law. The payments to Laurence Tribe, a constitutional law expert and legal icon – spanning May to December this year – were disclosed in a legal filing tied to Peabody’s bankruptcy proceedings. They do not include any money Peabody sent Tribe before its April bankruptcy filing as part of the company’s crusade against Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which is designed to slash carbon dioxide emissions from power plants 32% below 2005 levels by 2030. The programme encourages states and utilities to burn less coal and generate more electricity from cleaner sources, such as wind, solar power and natural gas.
