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King Coal
Coal was the commodity on which Britain built its industrial revolution and during World War II coal was the fuel which saved our country. It is also true that coal produced the smog of the 1950's and , later, the miners strike of 1984 was a bitter struggle of ideologies. But, we shouldn't blame coal - it is just a highly concentrated form of carbon and perhaps we should be a little more respectful of our coal industry which has had a very long history. In the Victorian era there was a rapid expansion as coal-fed steam engines were built for the railways and steamships. Early 1900's saw the production per annum of over 200 million tons (Mt). Sometimes the short ton is used in statistical data and a short ton contains 2000 pounds whereas a ton is 2240 pounds. To look after colliers working conditions the Miners Federation of Great Britain , MFGB, was founded in 1888. By 1919 the miners expected the coal industry to be nationalised as Sir John Sankey had recommended this in a specially convened commission. The government of the day did not act on this recommendation and a strike ensued in April 1921. The miners hoped for a "Triple Alliance" with railway and other transport workers joining in. The support only lasted for a short time and a general strike was averted; the miners acknowledging defeat in July of that year. This day is known as "Black Friday " in the labour movement and the bitter resentment of the miners was left as a legacy for the future. A more detailed history is given at en.wikipedia.org .
Today, few people have these sentiments and dismiss coal as a most vile and dirty fuel . However, as mentioned on page 7a, there is hope for King Coal; carbon capture and storage, CCS, could well give our coal industry a welcome boost and coal power stations with CCS would then give us a secure supply of electricity. On a global level coal looks promising as estimates suggest that we have only used approximately 8 % of our total coal resource whereas 67 % of world oil has been used and 50 % of our gas resource has been used. Estimates of world-wide reserves are at 900 billion tonnes and therefore "peak coal" (ie that date at which production is likely to peak) is put at 2100.
Britain relied on coal for most of its energy in the first half of the 20th century and, as page 5 shows, in the year 1965 our energy needs were met by about 120 Mtoe coal and 60 Mtoe of oil ( note - 1 Mtoe = 1.65 Mtce ). Oil and gas have contributed more to our energy needs since then as they offer far greater convenience.
Coal production for more than a century is shown below
From a peak production of about 260 million tons per year our present production is about 17.6 million tons. Whereas Britain used to export coal in the good old days, last year (2008) we imported about 44 million tons ( note - an imperial ton is very much the same as a metric tonne , 1 ton = 1.016 tonne ). Taking the year 1925, when production was 250 million tons, 95 million tons was exported and 155 tons was consumed within Britain. The breakdown was as follows:
Gas works 17.8 Mt, Electricity 4.9 Mt, Railways 14.3 Mt, Iron and Steel 36.9 Mt, Shipbuilding 23.4 , Coking 19.7 Mt , Mining 18.0 Mt and Domestic/ Service 20 Mt.
Countries presently producing over 100 Mt per annum are as follows:
China 2482 Mt, USA 990 Mt, India 427 Mt, Australia 309 Mt, South Africa 244 Mt, Russia 233 Mt and Indonesia 169 Mt. Worldwide, deep mining accounts for 60% of the total coal output with 40% being produced from opencast coalmines; in the UK it is almost a 50:50 split whereas Australia has 80% opencast to 20% deep mine.
Prominent Opencast sites in the UK are given on the following map.
Total annual production is seen as 9.3 Mt (deep mine 8.3 Mt for comparison)
Future stategies for coal should be promising as coal offers a secure source of energy for Britain for many decades. However, the recent decision of E-ON not to go ahead with a new 1.6 GW coal fired power station at Kingsnorth has left doubts in the industry. Any modern power station , eg DRAX, has to comply with the Large Combustion Plant Directive introduced in 2008 and they burn a range of fuels such as biomass and petroleum coke to optimise operation.
Despite this setback in UK it is felt that, world wide, coal will play a prominent part in our future energy scenario for the rest of the century.
If a Google search is made of Coal for the Future we have a recent article by Richard Girling, a conference at Sheffield, August 2009 and a host of other promising forecasts. With a decimated UK coal industry we will not be in a position to reap the benefits.
Recent references on coal
www.theiet.org/engtechmag select "archive issues " then under 2008 select "issue 19" which was printed on 8th November, article by Mark Venables entitled "back to Black".
Department of energy and Climate change - Energy Statistics : Coal www.decc.gov.uk
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