(Oil & Gas 360) – Despite some of the highest electricity prices in the world, the United Kingdom is relegating coal to the ash heap of history as it closes the doors on the Ratcliffe-on-Soar Power Station in north-central England.
The plant was commissioned in 1970 with a net electrical output of 2,000 megawatts.
October 1 will mark the end of an era in England, once one of the world’s predominant coal powers. The move makes the United Kingdom the first Group of 7 (G7) country to eliminate coal-fired electricity generation.
The G7 agreed to phase out unabated coal power plants by 2035 this past April. The G7 represents seven countries with advanced economies. It meets annually to discuss trade, security, and other issues of mutual interest. It’s over 50 years old.
The announcement comes as the nation’s new Prime Minister, Kier Starmer, vowed to make the U.K. a renewable energy powerhouse this week during a visit to Canada.
After the last coal is swept from the chute, the Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station will be retrofitted to become a renewable energy and technology hub.
The nation first targeted emissions from its coal mines (aka “the pits” in the local argot) less than 10 years ago; as recently as the 1980s, upwards of 70% of the country’s electricity came from coal.
Fellow G7 member Japan remains the world’s largest coal importer. The fossil fuel generates about 30% of Japan’s electricity. While that percentage has fallen, Japan trails far behind the average decline in coal-powered electricity than the other six members.
Two of those, the United States and Canada, are among the world’s top five coal exporters along with Australia, Indonesia, and Russia. The five countries comprise over 80% market share of global coal exports.
The latest data available shows the UK exported nearly 600,000 tons in 2022, a far cry from the 70+ million tons exported annually before World War One when the British Empire was a global industrial powerhouse that reigned over about a quarter of the world’s population and land mass.
As captured in Daniel Yergin’s classic book on the history of oil, The Prize, Winston Churchill actually built part of his political capital as a young politician by convincing The Royal Navy to convert from coal-powered sea navigation to oil, and a young George Orwell captured the harrowing life and work conditions in coal mine towns in his Road to Wigan Pier novel written eight years before Animal Farm.
By Jim Felton for oilandgas360.com
