Britain’s last coal-fired power station closes

The UK’s final coal-fired energy station will formally shut its doorways on Monday, making Britain the primary G7 nation to finish its reliance on the fossil gas to supply electrical energy.

The closure of Ratcliffe-on-Soar, an influence plant that has dominated the encircling central England panorama for practically 60 years, marks a symbolic step within the UK’s ambition to decarbonize electricity by 2030, and change into carbon impartial by 2050.

“The period of coal may be ending, however a brand new age of excellent energy jobs for our nation is simply starting,” Vitality Minister Michael Shanks stated in a press release.

The proprietor of the Ratcliffe-on-Soar manufacturing unit, Uniper stated the positioning can be put right into a two-year decommissioning interval starting in October.

The 350 Uniper workers and contractors that work on the website, will both be redeployed to different roles throughout the firm or go away the enterprise inside three redundancy home windows earlier than the tip of 2026, Uniper informed AFP.

As a replacement can be a brand new growth—a “carbon-free technology and energy hub”, the corporate stated.

It marks the tip of Britain’s 140-year dependence on coal because it turns into the primary within the G7 of wealthy nations to do away completely with coal energy electrical energy.

Italy plans to take action by subsequent 12 months, France in 2027, Canada in 2030 and Germany in 2038. Japan and the US haven’t any set dates.

“Britain has set an example the rest of the world must follow”, stated Doug Parr, coverage director at Greenpeace UK.

“There are further battles to be had to phase out oil and gas, fulfilling the promise by all countries at COP28 to transition away from fossil fuels,” he added.

‘Within the historical past books’

The polluting fossil gas performed a significant half in British financial historical past, powering the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and nineteenth centuries that made the nation a worldwide superpower.

Even into the Nineteen Eighties, it nonetheless represented 70 % of the nation’s electrical energy combine earlier than its share declined within the Nineteen Nineties as the federal government started to implement stricter laws to deal with air pollution.

Within the final decade the autumn has been even sharper, slumping to 38 % in 2013, 5.0 % in 2018 then simply 1.0 % final 12 months.

“Coal was the backbone of the UK’s power generation for over a century, but its place is now in the history books,” stated Mates of the Earth power campaigner, Tony Bosworth.

“The priority now is to move away from gas as well, by developing as fast as possible the UK’s huge homegrown renewable energy potential and delivering the economic boost that will bring,” he added.

In 2023, a 3rd of electrical energy manufacturing was made up of natural gas whereas 1 / 4 got here from wind power and 13 % from nuclear powerin keeping with electrical energy operator Nationwide Grid ESO.

The brand new Labour authorities has plans to additional decarbonize the power combine.

It launched its flagship inexperienced power plan after its election win in July, with the creation of a publicly owned physique to spend money on offshore windtidal energy and nuclear energy.

Lately, Ratcliffe-on-Soar, which had the potential to energy two million houses, was solely used when huge spikes in electrical energy use have been anticipated, equivalent to throughout a chilly snap in 2022 or the 2023 warmth wave.

Its final supply of 1,650 tonnes of coal at first of this summer season barely equipped 500,000 houses for eight hours.

The historical past of Britain’s reliance on coal dates again to 1882, when the world’s first coal-fired energy station was inbuilt central London.

© 2024 AFP