By Daniel Therkelsen – Campaign Manager, Coal Action Network
FUELLING, AND FUELLED BY, COLONIALISM
Coal powered Britain’s industrial and economic expansion during its Industrial Revolution. The abundance of coal discovered in Britain was a key factor that enabled the country’s early industrialisation, developing technologies and industries unfeasible elsewhere due to the lack of cheap energy sources. The British Empire’s expansion was partly driven by the need for other resources and labour to fuel this industrial growth, leading to the exploitation of natural resources in colonised regions.
The demand for coal intensified as the British economy expanded, and the empire’s infrastructure, such as steam-powered railways and ships, was largely powered by coal. This infrastructure extended the empire’s colonial expansion and exploitation of resources.
DECLINE IN EMPIRE AND COAL
The British Empire’s decline after World War II coincided with significant economic changes in the UK. As the empire contracted, the UK faced economic challenges that necessitated a shift in industrial focus. The coal industry, which had been a cornerstone of the British economy during the height of the empire, began to decline as the UK sought to modernise its economy and reduce reliance on traditional industries. As the empire declined, the UK faced increased competition from other countries that were industrialising and developing their own energy resources. This competition, combined with the high cost of domestic coal production, made coal less economically viable on the global market. These market conditions made it possible for Margaret Thatcher, then Prime Minister, to rapidly and infamously dismantle coal mining in the UK, closing 159 coal mines 1984-1994.
The Clean Air Act of 1950 and later environmental policies further accelerated the decline of coal. The “Dash for Gas” in the 1990s, driven by the repeal of restrictions on gas use in power stations, further reduced coal’s share in the energy mix. In the 2000s, improvements to battery storage, increasingly cheaper renewable energy technologies, and carbon credit schemes, made coal progressively uncompetitive and unnecessary.
ANTI-COLONIAL RESISTANCE IN THE 2000s
The decline in coal mining in the UK and the slower decline of coal use means the UK became increasingly dependent on coal imports, often from former colonies and poorer regions of the world. The colonial dynamics of this was increasingly centred by activists in the UK in grassroots resistance to ongoing coal dependency. Activists highlighted that the UK’s continuing use of coal in the UK had a double effect of inflicting on the global south; off-shoring localised environmental damage and displacement from coal mining, and then the worst consequences of climate change that burning that coal would return to those communities. The widely publicised climate camps and grassroots campaigning helped shape an increasingly negative public perception of coal. This, together with declining reliance on coal, coincided with a new UK Labour Government policy in 2009 that any new coal-fired power station would need to be fitted with carbon capture and storage. This technology was so expensive and largely ineffective that it effectively deterred any proposals for new coal-fired power stations. With existing and ageing coal-fired power stations coming to the end of their operating lives over the 15 years that followed, and now no coal-fired prospects to replace them, the Conservative Government that inherited this decline set in motion by the previous Government’s policy, branded it a new climate commitment to remove coal from the UK’s energy mix by 2025, later brought forward to 2024.
That brings us to Ratcliffe-on-Soar, that UK’s last coal-fired power station, fated to close at the end of September 2024, ending an era of coal-fired power generation in the UK. Coal used for other industrial purposes such as steel manufacturing and cement production are also a focus of decarbonisation efforts and public subsidy. As the UK moves away from the coal it used to rely upon, existing coal mines in the UK – most notably Aberpergwm, which is licenced to operate until 2039 – would need to export its coal to maintain sales. This could risk returning to a colonial dynamic where the UK benefits from dumping resources on developing countries that are considered unfit to use domestically due to air pollution and other factors.
