Quote:
Originally Posted by Eric
As pits (that's "pits" as in coal mines, not "pits" as in Thatcherism was the pits  ) and coal mining seem to be cropping up a lot in this thread, I don't think it's too much of a wander to question why Britain now imports coal  Can some informed right-wing economist explain this? "Carrying coals to Newcastle" comes to mind.  Seems like 40% of Uk's energy came from coal last winter. (I could post a link; but if anyone is interested, there's an article in the "Guardian"; I'm sure you are all capable of finding it.) Now, let me think about this I don't read of Saudi Arabia importing oil ... or Saskatchewan, wheat ... or Canada, uranium. So, why are you guys importing coal? Did you run out or something? Don't you have the expertise to mine the stuff? Is there nobody over there who wants to work in the mines? |
About 40% of our coal is UK mined. Coal from abroad( mainly Russia) is cheaper. Many of our mines(MOG can probably say more) were 'deep mines' which produced high quality but expensive coal. Power stations didn't need the high quality anyway.
We have 300 years of reserves, based on the high usage of the 70's and 80's so heaven knows how long it would last at present rates of usage.
Why spend a fortune re-opening or starting new mines- the EU won't let us burn coal. Two coal fired power stations closed a couple of weeks ago, they'll all be gone soon. We have no means to replace their output so we could be facing power shortages in the next few years.
What a wicked waste.
Is it sensible?
No, it's politics.