In February 2020 Extinction Rebellion said that it was "complete lunacy" to bring coal from Australia to Port Talbot steel works in South Wales. Why does the U.K. import coal thousands of miles from Siberia, the U.S. and Australia for its steel industry but holds back on U.K. home coal mining?
During the recently reported "coal free" period of no domestic electricity generation in Britain, we imported an estimated 40.4GWh of coal fired electricity from the Netherlands. The associated emissions are off shore into Europe so are kept off our statistics.
We do occasionally see significant amounts of coal being used, up to 5GW but only on a few days each year. This makes me think it is only used when there is a need to conserve gas supplies.
I've no objection to the occasional use of coal, it seems much more CO2 friendly than building new power stations to act a reserve capacity - or even batteries.
We do occasionally see significant amounts of coal being used, up to 5GW but only on a few days each year. This makes me think it is only used when there is a need to conserve gas supplies.
I've no objection to the occasional use of coal, it seems much more CO2 friendly than building new power stations to act a reserve capacity - or even batteries.
