Prompted by the recent Cumbrian coal news, I recall being told at school in the 70s that the UK was sitting on 300 years worth of coal. Presumably extractable with the technology of the day, even if uneconomically.
Anyone know if this was and/or is true now ?
It was only recently I learned that there won't be any coal anymore thanks to evolution ....
The problem is that '300 years of coal' is, on its own, totally meaningless. Its an Art studenty thing to say.
I've got '300 years of coal' buried in the garden somewhere from the old house. the new house never uses any...
- how much coal a year do we burn?
- what price is considered economic to mine it at?
There is very little economic coal left: I am surprised a cumbrian mine is worth opening at all
Whatcha talkin 'bout Jethro?
Uneconomic to deep mine coal in the UK, and then you have the problem of disposing of the spoil and dealing with subsidence. The M6 apparently 'sagged' by 3 feet ..
Better to dig out and make our own than import from far away. Using it for heating is another argument which the greenies are getting confused with.
I did caveat by saying it was damn near 50 years ago :)
This was the standard line used in CEGB indoctrination courses that I attended in the late 60's, I guess it came from a Government (or perhaps NCB) statistic.
We were also told that oil was going to run out in the 1980's.
The latter, of course, simply comes from "current economically extractable reserves" divided by "current consumption plus a growth factor".
Similarly dumb calculations are used to argue that "the lithium for batteries" or the "rare earth metals for phones" are going to run out.
Oil companies used to publish known reserves figures to provide collateral for their debt, thus maintaining their share prices and their ability to borrow for future developments.
It all depends on what assumptions you make. I went into the nuclear power industry fifty years ago because I judged that, one day, the UK coal reserves would be too valuable to burn in power stations because they would become a feedstock for plastics and fuel for large transport vehicles (trucks, ships, planes). I thought nuclear was a good match for electric cars because useful ranges were achievable with overnight recharging, thus reducing the need for expensive capital plant to load cycle.
Politics gets in the way of economics. For a long while after the availability of North Sea Gas UK power stations were not allowed to burn it. Neither were they allowed to import open-cast coal from Australia that was actually cheaper than UK deep-mined coal.
I know - it was in place when I worked for British Gas.
Made 100% sense to me. Why burn gas to make electricity to heat houses and cook food, when we have a perfectly good (and genuinely world beating) delivery network that means you can heat your house and cook without needing a f****ng power station and it's associated inefficiencies in between ?????
Hams Hall being an experimental exception.
Only because fusion was going to come on line then, surely?
we probably do still have 300 years of coal (calculated at expected annual fuel needs)
The problem is, it's seen as an unclean fuel and we have decided that we shouldn't use it
Because in many case the network does not exist. Like here for a start. Also using a heat pump should take a 60% efficient gas power station and give it a 3 times uplift to around 180% 'efficient'. So almost half the gas of burning it direct..
So it should last forever.
Peak coal was around 1958 IIRC in this country.
We no longer build ships and railway stuff is aluminium. So we don't need the steel production
What on earth are you wibbling on about ? The High Pressure Grid was ready in the 1970s and saw North Sea (formerly High Speed) gas distributed to about 70% of the UKs population.
Hence it was bonkers to burn the stuff to make electricity. Even to supply the last 30%.
However, it makes for cheap power stations. So another fact in my collection of "climate change is bollocks" folder, where I watch what the priest does rather than listen to the sermon.
Even rails ?
How many miles of new track have we laid this century?
Obviopusly we still use steel, just not in anything like the quantities we used to
Unless you are a Green German
HS2 is going to use a *lot* of steel. Bridges, reinforcement in tunnels and sleepers. Power gantries. Wheels bogies and frames are still steel.
Peak coal was as much associated with domestic heating as with industry.
engineering facts
What about the other 30% then?
Today it isn't because of heat pumps It wasn't then because electricity wasn't really used for heating much. And gas was the cheapest way to generate it once the subsidies to the miners were removed
What on earth are you wibbling on about ?
You think it will ever get finished?
Agreed. Coal central heating is pants more or less. everyone who could went gas, the rest went oil or leccy.
Well, we already had a decent electricity network in the 70s anyway. No need to burn gas for it.
So no losses whatsoever in conversion ?
If you're happy to waste energy burning gas to make electricity, then there can't be too much of a climate crisis going on, can there ?
I would be entirely unsurprised if the answer were negative ..
Had a fun day out at a steel mill in Stoke a few years back. Pretty much the embodiment of Dantes inferno, with an ear splitting crash every so often as a massive (100+ tonne ?) rolled out the end.
About the fact that the gas grid network does not go everywhere. Like this village, for example, and the last one we lived in.
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