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Sign this petition to stop the expansion of UK’s biggest opencast coal mine

See our Welsh language version of this webpage.

Wales is about to decide whether to expand the UK’s largest opencast coal mine by nearly 4 years, emitting almost 6 million tonnes of CO2, and 16,000 tonnes of methane from the coal mine itself.

The climate-trashing Ffos-y-fran coal mine in Merthyr Tydfil extracts up to 50,000 tonnes of coal every month – coal that the European Court of Justice ruled was too polluting to be burned in the old Aberthaw power station, and is now burned mainly at steelworks. This locks TATA steelworks into being the UK’s 2nd most polluting site!

Sign the petition now

Enough is enough!

We demand that the Welsh Government:

  1. calls in the decision if the local Council considers granting planning permission to expand the Ffos-y-fran opencast coal mine.
  2. acts on climate science, listens to local residents, and follows its own laws and policies such as the Future Generations Act.
  3. swiftly rejects expanding the UK’s largest opencast coal mine, includes workersa Universal Basic Income pilot, and invests in jobs with a future.

When permission was granted by the Welsh Government in 2005, the local community in Merthyr Tydfil, who had fought the proposal fiercely, were promised that mining would end after 15 years, in September 2022 and that restoration of the land would be complete by the end of the following year. Yet it’s reported that coal mining hasn’t stopped, ruining the long-awaited peace for the local community who can see and hear the coal mine from their homes. And now the mining company has applied to expand the coal mine by 9 months, and has said it will for a further 3 years of coal mining, (and who knows what beyond that...?).

This will not only fuel climate change by almost 6 million tonnes of CO2, but inflict explosive further blasting, noise and dust pollution on nearby residents. On top of this, the long-awaited restoration of the land, will be pushed back by years, with concerns that it will never happen.

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Published: 21/11/22

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