Suncoke Energy
SXC
Materials
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exclusion reasons
2 themes
This page is part of our public exclusion list — a transparency tool that shows which companies we screen out and why. It is not investment advice, and it is not an accusation. But it is subject to change as our understanding of the facts evolves.
SunCoke Energy is the largest independent producer of metallurgical coke in the Americas, with a reported U.S. production capacity of approximately 3.7 million tons. The company's primary business is converting metallurgical coal into coke, an essential fuel and chemical reactant for steelmaking in blast furnaces. In 2024, the company generated $1.94 billion in sales from this activity.
The company's operations have direct, documented links to significant community and regulatory impacts stemming from coal. In 2025, SunCoke Energy reached a $36.0 million settlement related to federal black lung benefits. This follows the company's 2025 purchase of affiliated Virginia coal companies, including Harold Keene Coal Co., indicating ongoing vertical integration into coal mining. Its heat-recovery cokemaking technology, while capturing waste heat for power, is fundamentally a coal-based industrial process. The company reported a net loss for 2025 amid declining coking coal markets, underscoring its financial dependence on this commodity.
SunCoke Energy operates metallurgical coke plants in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Virginia, producing a key input for steelmaking. In 2022, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Justice announced a settlement with SunCoke and its Haverhill North Coke subsidiary for violations of the Clean Air Act at its facility in Haverhill, Ohio. The settlement required the companies to install and operate air pollution control technology estimated to cost $100 million to reduce sulfur dioxide and particulate matter emissions, and to pay a $2.2 million civil penalty. The EPA documented that the facility had been operating without the required pollution controls for years, resulting in excess emissions of harmful pollutants.
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Companies appear on our exclusion list based on our investment judgment — not because they've done anything illegal. This is a difference of values and opinion, not an accusation of wrongdoing. Exclusion does not constitute a recommendation against investing in any company, and absence from the list does not constitute a recommendation to invest.
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