CAN, Author at Coal Action Network - Page 7 of 9

Through the Wayuu-led NGO Nación Wayuu, indigenous Wayuu elders and community leaders are gathering in a 'Permanent Assembly' - an ongoing dialogue, which can involve peaceful action to demand justice from the coal company Cerrejón, which operates Latin America's biggest coal mine in the northernmost state of Colombia, La Guajira.

This is a powerful step by communities next to the railway line where open-top carriages take coal across the state to the port. They were not included in the recent UN investigation but also suffer devestating impacts.

Cerrejón is owned by three mining multinationals who are all listed on the London Stock Exchange: Anglo American, Glencore, and BHP. They have recently been ordered to stop expanding the mine and as a result Anglo American and Glencore are now suing the Colombian Government.

(English Translation. Spanish here)

According to their legal and constitutional rights, the Traditional Authorities of the Indigenous Wayuu Movement (located in the municipalities of Maicao, are Manaure and Uribia, ancestral guardians of the territories which have been robbed and desecrated by the train track belonging to Cerrejón Limited) inform the national and international public that from 1st June 2021 they will declare a PERMANENT ASSEMBLY* for the following reasons:

For more than 40 years, the indigenous territories located in the municipality of Albania, Maicao, Manaure and Uribia, were desecrated and divided by the construction of the train line belonging to the Cerrejón company, which gave passage to an immense iron-clad long-tailed animal: a train.

The passage of this immense animal changed the lives of the Wayuu people, who now are feeling death which initially came to them slowly, and now is gathering pace. The most affected are women and children, but also the workers who go to the mine.

The situation is so critical that recently, the UN urged the mine to suspend operations in the municipality of Barrancas, near to the Wayuu reservation of Provincial, for reasons of pollution, water scarcity, and the prevention of transmission of Covid-19 in the communities who live there.

The UN High Commission in Human Rights urged the suspension of some of Cerrejón's opencast coal mine operations, located in La Guajira, Northern Colombia.

UN experts insisted the pollution that the mine produced has caused serious damage to the health of the indigenous Wayuu community who reside in this region, bordering on Venezuela.

David Boyd, UN special rapporteur for Human Rights and the Environment, said “at least during the pandemic, the operations in the Tajo Patilla site near to the Provincial reservation should be suspended until they can demonstrate that it is safe.”

He added that the Cerrejón mine had not done enough to comply with the orders of the Colombian authorities, which in December demanded the company improve air quality and limit the damage to the area's inhabitants.

According to UN commission experts, the residents suffer headaches, breathing and nasal problems, dry coughs, burning eyes and blurred vision as a consequence of the exploitation of the Cerrejón mine.

The pollution produced by Cerrejón does not only affect the communities near to the Tajo Patilla or the Provincial reservation, but also the indigenous communities, ancestral guardians of the territories located along the length of the train line and the banks of the Rancheria River. In this second wave of infections in this pandemic that threatens to exterminate humanity, these communities have been seriously affected, leaving countless people dead and many more infected, but this does not matter to the Cerrejon company, who continue their mining operation regardless.

It has been five years since the sentence was handed down which ordered urgent action to benefit the indigenous people of La Guajira, but this judicial order has not been followed through.

The justice system has placed at least 17 sanctions on Cerrejón Coal Limited for the effects that opencast coal mining has brought to the indigenous Wayuu people who live in the immediate vicinity of the mine in La Guajira. The last decision was handed down by the Constitutional Court on 13th December 2016, which included an order to compensate indigenous Wayuu communities for the severe environmental, social and cultural damage, but to this day they have offered nothing but a half-hearted semblance of compliance with this sentence.

As ancestral guardians of territory exploited by the company Cerrejón, we demand the following:

1. Suspend the train operation which transports coal to Puerto Bolivar at the weekends for 24 hours each day (Saturday and Sunday)
2. Urgently reinitiate dialogues which were unilaterally suspended by Cerrejón under the false pretext of the pandemic.
3. Comply strictly with the Constitutional Court order T-704/16

This communication is signed on 1st June 2021 by the Traditional Wayuu authorities, ancestral guardians of this territory.

*Language note: Permanent Assembly refers to an ongoing or recurring gathering to protest and/or engage in dialogue to further a campaign

The last opencast coal mine in England should now have closed, as has East Pit in Neath Port Talbot Wales. This leaves two operating in Wales and none in Scotland.[1]

The existing mines, by company are:

Celtic Energy: Nant Helen, Powys (due to close December 2021)

Merthyr (South Wales): Ffos-y-fran, Merthyr Tydfil (due to close in 2022)

Other former opencast sites are being put back. Banks Group is expected to vacate the Pont Valley, Durham in June 2021.

There are currently no planning applications for new opencast coal mines in the UK after Banks Group had three proposals refused in 2020 thanks to incredible campaigning by local groups.

Drax power station has stopped burning coal after decades of importing coal from the USA, Russia, Colombia and UK mines. Drax has dropped plans to convert the coal units to gas. Much of the wood for its biomass comes from the clear-felling of biodiverse forests in Europe and the Southern USA which are home to many rare and endangered species.

EDF are closing their West Burton coal power station in September 2022. West Burton burns coal from Banks Group’s opencast mines in the North East of England, as well as imported coal.

Kilroot coal and oil power station in Northern Ireland is going to be converted to gas. It has recently been announced that Kilroot will stop consuming coal in September 2023.

At Ratcliffe on Soar power station the owner Uniper plans to turn the power station into an incinerator for household waste and produce heat and electricity. There is no planning permission for this yet. It is the only UK coal power station without an date announced for it to cease using coal.

Coal phase-out in the UK is expected by October 2024. Given that coal consumption in power stations is very low in the summer, the last generation could be April 2024.

There are currently no underground mines operating of significant size.

Proposed Underground Mines

West Cumbria Mining had their proposal for a new underground coking coal mine off Whitehaven, Cumbria called in by the Secretary of State. This means that the council's previous decisions to approve the application will be thoroughly investigated by the Planning Inspectorate in September 2021 before the Secretary of State decides whether the mine will be stopped.

New Age Explorations (an Australian company) are applying for licences for an underground coking coal mine at Lochinvar, on the border between England and Scotland. If constructed the company hopes to be producing coal until 2044.

There are four major UK steel producers:

Tata Steel
Port Talbot steel works, in Neath Port Talbot, Wales, is the second biggest UK single site emitter of carbon dioxide.[2] The plant uses coking coal to make steel in blast furnaces.

Liberty
Liberty Steel, which has sites in Newport and in Tredegar, has said it aims to become a carbon-neutral steel producer by 2030.[3] The site currently uses Electric Arc Furnaces and recycles scrap metal so does not use coking coal.

British Steel
Currently British steel's Scunthorpe plant can use a maximum of 25% to 30% recycled content using Basic Oxygen Steel making.[4] It currently uses coking coal.

Celsa
Celsa's Cardiff steelworks uses 100% recycled scrap steel in its products and so does not need coking coal.[5]

Damning new report reveals the indigenous communities torn up by coal imports that continue to power Europe and its steel industry

Today, Tuesday 30^th March, Still Burning - a network against hard coal and neocolonialism – releases a new report Still Burning. The report shines a spotlight on Europe's continued coal imports in the run-up to COP26. It also tells the harrowing but little-known stories of the communities from Russia, Colombia, the USA, and Australia whose homes and way of life are literally torn up to mine the coal beneath them, suffering widespread human rights abuses.

Coal production around Europe is falling, but in Russia it’s rising to compensate and to extend the market eastwards.

Some European governments have announced coal power phase-outs, but some like in Germany are so far away (2038) as to be almost meaningless. Even in countries where coal for electricity has been phased out - such as Austria - are consuming coal to make steel. In fact in Austria coal-fired blast furnaces, are the single biggest site emitters of CO2 in the country.

There is an urgent need to stop all coal extraction and decarbonise the electricity and steel making industries.

You can download the report from https://stillburning.net/book/

Still Burning concludes that European utilities and governments must bear more responsibility for the disaster that is unfolding in coal producing regions, and so must act to halt and reverse the damage as well as compensate those impacted.

Our high energy lifestyles are fuelled by coal mines abroad forced on people unfortunate enough to live close to large coal deposits. These people rarely see any of the financial wealth raised from the exports to Europe of coal from under their homes. Instead, they are left with all the local harms and often the worst impacts of climate change.

Continues below...

Russia is the biggest exporter of coal to Europe supplying 41% of the coal imported into the European Union in 2017. 76% of Russia’s coal is mined in Kuzbass – an area in southwest Siberia and most of the coal produced there is shipped to Europe and Asia.

Valentina Bekrinova, a native Shor person living in the village of Chuvashka, Kuzbass, Siberia says, “In front of the house is the Sibirginsky mine. On the other side of the house there is a waste tip from another mine. Our village is surrounded by coal mining, and the dust which blows from the mines and waste heaps coats everything…I’m afraid that Shor people will soon become extinct. This is why the most important thing is the protection of our ecology, our rivers, our taiga for the protection of our nation. We cannot live without [them].”

While the impacts of burning coal in power station on our climate receives some attention the human and local ecological consequences are almost always overlooked. But the consequences are dire:

“I wish that people became more aware of where their coal comes from. And about the consequences” says Luz Angela Uriana Epiayu, mother of Moisés Daniel, a young child who is seriously ill with lung disease living next to the Cerrejón coal mine, owned by foreign interests.

The giant open-pit Cerrejón coal mine in La Guajira, northern Colombia. The mine is the biggest of its kind in the world and is jointly owned by Anglo American, BHP and Glencore. The Cerrejón mine is in Wayúu indigenous territory and when mining began over 30 years ago, local people were not consulted. Instead their lands were seized, and communities were forcibly displaced, violating their constitutional land rights. The Colombian government has failed to adequately compensate any of the affected communities. Pollution and dust from the coal mine has caused the contamination of water supplies and the air.

Narlis Guzmán Angulo a human rights defender from Cesar in Colombia living near the Drummond coal mine says, “In La Sierra we have always been able to feed ourselves with our agriculture, but that is over... Opencast coal mining ruined everything. It has brought us all this: the collapse of the social fabric, unemployment, death, missing persons, displaced persons, political corruption, the loss of the vocation of our ancestors, the loss of our roots, environmental pollution, disease, prostitution, the sexual commercialisation of children, drug addiction, and poisoned water...”.

The answer to these problems is not to open more coal mines in Europe. True solidarity with people at the front-lines of coal extraction means closing all coal mines globally and to move rapidly away from technology which relies on coal and produces vast emissions.

Read the full report https://stillburning.net/book/ and also see films about these issues by Still Burning here.

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There's a growing momentum against a new coking coal in Cumbria.

Coal Action Network has now handed in our petition to the Secretary of State, but there are plenty of ways you can be involved. Will you share the video on your social media?

Cumbria County Council has said it will review its decision to allow this mine.

Will you support these actions by other groups?

South Lakes Action on Climate Change Crowd funder to raise money to pay for legal challenges to the planning permission

Greenpeace's massive petition to Boris Johnson

Campaign to Protect Rural England's call to contact the Secretary of State

Want to join other Coal Action Network actions? Join our mailing list and never miss a call to action.

Want us to add your to get amplification of your actions against this application?

Today [8th February 2021], youth climate activists added their voice against the planned coking coal mine in West Cumbria. Elijah McKenzie-Jackson submitted a 111,475 signature petition to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government asking Robert Jenrick MP to stop the planned coal mine. The petition was delivered by post and supported by a digital demonstration of 72 young activists.

Elijah says, “In the year where the UK hosts the COP26 summit the UK government must call in and refuse an application to mine coking coal, showing its commitment to decarbonising the steel sector.”

Despite being a contentious issue for several years was Robert Jenrick, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, said that he would allow the Cumbria County Council planning approval to stand. He said the matter was a ‘local issue’. In reality, the emissions equal 2% of the UK's carbon footprint, which makes it a decision of national importance. This petition and digital protest calls on him to change his mind and save face in the year the UK hosts both the Conference of Parties 26 (COP26) counter climate change summit and meeting of the G7 nations.

In West Cumbria Mining Ltd.’s proposal, the new coal mine would produce nearly three million tonnes of coking coal a year and result in nine million tonnes of CO2-equivalent emissions every year. Despite this, West Cumbria Mining Ltd. convinced Cumbria County Council that this mine would be carbon neutral.

As Economist Professor Paul Ekins of University College London explains in a video by the Coal Action Network the idea this mine would be carbon neutral as “nonsense”. He explains, “The notion that opening new coal mines in England will not lead to increasing greenhouse gas emissions is quite simply, economic nonsense and here's why. Opening a new coal mine does not mean that other coal mines will produce less coal or close. It simply means that there will be more coal dug up, looking for markets and the markets will expand to accommodate it. That is the story of coal since the industrial revolution.”

The mine would supply ‘coking’ coal to steel works, at least 85% of which would be exported to Europe as it is too high in sulphur to be burnt in large quantities in the two large UK steel works, in Port Talbot and Scunthorpe which use coking coal. Unless it’s left in the ground, the coal will contribute to climate change, the burden of which will fall disproportionately on young people, especially those living in the Global South. Their voice must be heard in this debate.

18 year old Jahnavee Palsodkar said, "I am from India which is considered to be in both the global south and most affected people and areas (MAPA) and I wanted to show that the UK is sending the wrong signal to the rest of the world in approving this coking coal mine. By doing this, they are contradicting themselves while they plan to host the COP 26 in November. Concrete climate policy is shown through action, not words.

The emissions it will cause will lead to the climate crisis increasing worldwide. The decision makers are disregarding the plight of the MAPA due to the menace of climate change. It is extremely inhumane to advocate for a project that will devastate the life of so many from the global south.

I started advocating for climate justice because I saw that it is affecting the world disproportionately. The global south are already facing the major brunt of climate crisis caused mostly by the global north, such as European countries and the US. In this situation, it is the Global North's moral responsibility to minimise their carbon emissions and consumption so as to ease the suffering of their brethren across the earth. And it is my responsibility to do my best to advocate for the same."

These young people are adding their voices to that of eminent scientist James Hansen, Lord Deben, Chairman of the Climate Change Committee, teen climate activist Greta Thunberg and over 80 NGOs so far who have called on the government to call in this decision, start a public inquiry and reject the application.

Isabella Bridgman from Cockermouth in Cumbria says, I call on the Secretary of State to call in this mine, in recognition that approving such a mine when the UK is set to host COP26 this year, and has committed to reach carbon neutral by 2050, is not only ridiculous, but actively harmful. West Cumbria deserves better than a polluting mine whose existence is unsustainable in the long term due to the UK governments commitment to reaching net-zero carbon by 2050.

Hannah Wright (16) from Kendal, Cumbria said “The decision to build a coal mine doesn’t make sense for two reasons. Firstly, this decision shouldn’t just be for the local government to make, as the impact of the coal mine won’t just affect Cumbria, a decision of this scale and impact should be made on a national level. Secondly it doesn’t make sense that by 2035 the UK will stop using coal for steel making to meet its climate targets, meaning the coal mine in Cumbria will only be short term. So why not invest in a new source of green energy which will help to generate jobs and be both sustainable environmentally and economically?"

Until Cumbria County Council formally approves the mine, Robert Jenrick can reverse his previous decision not to call in the application for government arbitration. In the year the UK hosts COP26 and the G7 decisions like this could have global consequences.

Thanks to everyone who helped, this action was a success and resulted in this coverage, ‘Coal is not the goal’: Teenage climate activists deliver petition to government over Cumbria coal mine

Opposition is growing to a plan for a massive underground coking coal mine under the sea near Whitehaven, in the north west of England. Cumbria County Council gave permission for the mine to extract nearly 3 million tonnes of coal until 2049. The coal is mostly for export and is ‘coking’ coal that would be consumed by the carbon-intensive steel industry. [1] Despite this, the mining company claim the coal mined would be ‘carbon neutral’.., and the Council believed them! Mining new coal can never be carbon neutral of course, but if there’s any doubt, here’s an expert explaining why. We're angry that the government is failing to stop this coal mine, not least in the same year that it hosts the COP26 global climate summit. The government can still stop this mine.
Thanks to everyone who sent us photos are part of this process. We are going to be putting them into a film and releasing them to the media and on social media soon. Watch this space!

For those who sent us photos, you agreed that: By sending us a photo, you and your parent/guardian agree for us to use the photo in the video described, on our website and social media, and to share with third-party video producers and media. You also understand that you may be identifiable from the photo and the photo may be used in related campaigns in the future. We won't publish your name unless it’s in your image, or we ask you first. If you change your mind later, we can delete your photo but we cannot remove it where others have saved it/shared it.

Many thanks,

Anne Harris and the team at Coal Action Network

References

[1] Cumbria County Council Executive Director - Economy and Infrastructure, Development

control and regulation committee Application Reference No:4/17/90077.17 (2 October 2020)

[2] Ember, Europe’s coal power collapse exposes steel plants as Europe’s biggest emitters (2019) https://ember-climate.org/project/ets-2019-release/

What's been proposed?

West Cumbria Mining Ltd. want to extract 2.78 million tonnes of coking coal a year from under the sea near Whitehaven in a ‘deep’ coal mine. Cumbria County Council gave permission for them to do so until 2049 in October 2020. The coal is predominantly for export and would be consumed by the steel industry.

What is coking coal?

Coking coal is a type of coal used in steel works to create steel using blast furnaces. In the UK, the second and third biggest single site emitters of CO2e (gasses which cause climate change) are Port Talbot and Scunthorpe steel works respectively, which both use coking coal.ⁱ Coking coal (also known as metallurgical coal) is a reducing agent in the creation of steel from iron. It has a higher monetary value than thermal coal which is used in power stations to generate electricity.

Producing steel from coal is a high carbon process. If this mine were to go ahead and the coal was extracted and consumed it would produce 9 million tonnes of CO2e a year,ⁱⁱ at a time when we need to drastically reduce the emissions, especially in the most affluent countries.

Where would the coal go if it was extracted?

West Cumbria Mining Ltd. say that 83% of the coal extracted would be sold abroad,ⁱⁱⁱ via the port at Redcar potentially to Europe. Only up to 17% is expected to be used in the UK^iv because this coking coal has a high sulphur content.^v If the British steel industry use too much, it risks exceeding the sulphur dioxide limits plants must adhere to. Sulphur dioxide causes acid rain.

But we need coking coal to make steel don't we?

No. Using coking coal is just one way to produce steel. Two of the four large steel manufacturers in the UK (Liberty Steel and Celsa) use electric arc furnaces to recycle scrap steel into new steel. This doesn't use coking coal. Direct Reduction Iron, another way to make steel, doesn't rely on coal to reduce the iron, although sometimes it does use it.^vi

Most of the big steel makers are investing and innovating so that they can decarbonise the steel sector. There aren't big UK projects doing this at the moment. The HYBRIT project in Sweden is expecting to be making commercial-scale steel by 2026.^vii Various methods are being worked on, including those looking to use hydrogen and those which propose using unsustainable fuels like fossil gas to reduce iron until green hydrogen (where the energy comes from renewable electricity) is available. The Climate Change Committee has said, “Government should set targets for ore-based steelmaking ... in the UK to reach near-zero emissions by 2035”. When this happens the UK won't be using any coking coal by 2035, 14 years before this mine is due to stop production.^viii

Onland infrastructure of the proposed mine, the majority of the extraction site is below the sea

What's the process so far?

Cumbria County Council have approved the application for a deep coal mine twice, although the councillors showed that they didn't fully understand the climate change implications. Amendments were made to the first application due to a successful Judicial Review. The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, Robert Jenrick, said that if the Council was intending to approve the application he would consider calling it in and making the decision himself. He has since decided not to intervene.

Why does this decision matter?

Steel making using coal is an emissions intensive industry. This is worsening the impacts of climate change and increasing the negative impacts across communities globally as well as biodiversity collapse. The UK is hosting the COP26 climate change summit in November of this year. The government is pushing the Powering Past Coal Alliance and wants to be seen as active on action on climate change issues. Approving a new coal mine goes against this. Failure to intervene in this matter sends a signal to other governments that it’s acceptable to call yourself a ‘leader’ on climate change whilst continuing climate-wrecking practices. Following Robert Jenrick's decision, the Climate Change Committee wrote to him asking him to outlining the climate and international political issues of his decision.^ix

What can we do to stop this application?

There are a number of groups who are working to ensure that this mine does not get the full go-ahead. Permission is still needed for the section of the mine under the sea from the Marine Management Organisation and from the Coal Authority.

You could sign our petition asking Robert Jenrick to reconsider his decision not to intervene in this application by launching a public inquiry.
Donate to South Lakes Action on Climate Change's crowd funder to pursue legal challenges against the government and Cumbria County Council for their decisions on this issue.
Sign up to the Coal Action Network's email list, check out our website, or follow us on twitter and facebook to find out about our exciting campaigns where we will work with you to carry out (covid secure) actions against the mine.

References

iEmber, Coal Free Kingdom (13th November 2019) https://ember-climate.org/project/coal-free-kingdom/ and Drax Group, Enabling a zero carbon, lower cost energy future page 39 (2019) https://www.drax.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Drax_AR2019_Web.pdf

iiCumbria County Council Executive Director - Economy and Infrastructure, Development control and regulation committee Application Reference No:4/17/90077.17 (2 October 2020) point 7.107 page 35

iiiCumbria County Council Executive Director - Economy and Infrastructure, Development control and regulation committee Application Reference No:4/17/90077.17(2 October 2020) point 7.130 page 38

iv0.36 million tonnes out of 2.78 million tonnes produced annually Cumbria County Council Executive Director - Economy and Infrastructure, Development control and regulation committee Application Reference No:4/17/90077.17 (2 October 2020) point 7.17 page 20

vCumbria County Council Executive Director - Economy and Infrastructure, Development control and regulation committee Application Reference No:4/17/90077.17 (2 October 2020) multiple points page 32

viInternational Iron Metallics Association, DRI production, viewed 1 February 2021, https://www.metallics.org/dri-production.html

viiBloomberg Green, Sweden Moves Closer to Making Fossil-Fuel-Free Steel (31 August 2020)

https://www.bloombergquint.com/business/sweden-advances-on-road-to-fossil-free-steel-with-three-way-jv

viiiClimate Change Committee, Policies for the Sixth Carbon Budget and Net Zero (December 2020) https://www.theccc.org.uk/publication/sixth-carbon-budget/page 96, table 4.1

ixCImate Change Committee, Letter: Deep Coal Mining in the UK (29^th January 2020) https://www.theccc.org.uk/publication/letter-deep-coal-mining-in-the-uk/

We're disappointed to let you know that on the 6^th January 2020, the Secretary of State for Housing Communities and Local Government, Robert Jenrick said that the government will not step in and review Cumbria County Council's decision to approve the Woodhouse Colliery Application.

West Cumbria Mining want to extract nearly 3 million tonnes of coking coal for export to Europe every year until 2049 from a site next to the coast at Whitehaven, Cumbria. In October 2020 Cumbria Council approved the amended application by West Cumbria Mining. Robert Jenrick has said in advance of the hearing, that if this were the decision he would consider 'calling it in' and deciding the application himself.

Campaign Group, South Lakes Action on Climate Change, towards transitions said in a statement, "The Secretary of State has decided NOT to "call in" the planning application! We are extremely disappointed (but not surprised) that Robert Jenrick is insisting that West Cumbria Mining's plan to extract nearly 3 million tonnes of coal a year is not considered to be of national importance, and can be simply a local decision. Even though Cumbria County Council restricted the permission to the end of 2049, rather than 2070 [as WCM had applied for] this is still an outrageous decision that flies in the face of the UK's promises to address climate change and their claim to leadership through this year's COP 26.

Very little of this coal will be suitable for the UK steel industry, and it will be exported with no enforceable control on where or how it is used. It will give rise to around 9 million tonnes of CO2e emissions annually for the next 30 years, and is likely to undermine both the decarbonisation of the steel industry and also the emerging pledges to reduce emissions.

However this is not the end of the struggle. Even before County Council issues the Decision Notice, SLACC's legal team at Richard Buxtons Solicitors will be assessing the options for taking further legal action." If you'd like to help SLACC's continued action against this application, could you donate to, or share their crowdfunder https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/westcumbriamineslacc/

At the October planning hearing it was clear that several of the Cumbria County Councillor's did not fully understand the climate change impacts of the proposal. Nor did they understand the submission from Professor Paul Ekins showing that extracting coking coal in the UK increases the amount of coal consumed, as it will be used in addition to that imported to Europe from abroad.

This is a missed opportunity for the UK government to show a commitment to tackling climate change and to place their faith in steel companies converting to use existing and developing ways to produce steel without coal. There are various ways being investigated to further this campaign against the mine. Sign up to our email list to be part of it.

Today Newcastle City Council stood with many of it’s residents and unanimously rejected Banks Group’s proposal to extract 800.000 tonnes of thermal coal from Dewley Hill!

We’re delighted at this result. At a virtual hearing councillors followed the Planning Officer’s advice and rejected the application due to five contraventions of the Newcastle Development and Allocations Plan 2015-2030; four contraventions of the Core strategy and Urban Core plan for Gateshead and Newcastle 2010-2030, a breach of the Northumberland minerals plan and paragraph 211a of the National Planning Policy Framework.

Brilliant local group against the application, Defend Dewley Hill are delighted by the result. Local resident Jos Forester-Melville said, “None of us set out on the journey to become activists, but this bunch of taxi drivers, occupational therapists, managers, shop assistants, care workers, teachers, young and older people alike, have joined forces to defend the land we live on and have inadvertently become a campaign group together striving to see an end to fossil fuels. We know that coal is the most catastrophic fossil fuel for our climate and that industries such as steel are rapidly developing new technology to eradicate coal use. We are so pleased that the council listened to common sense and stopped this application.”

There are currently no other applications for new opencast coal mines in the UK. What an incredible position to be in. There is only one opencast operating in England, it is due to close this year. There are none in Scotland and only two in Wales. We sincerely hope that the coal companies realise that “Coal is our heritage, not our future” as local people living in the North East’s ex-mining villages keep saying.

Defend Dewley Hill had instructed Richard Buxton, environmental solicitors, to contact the council on their behalf over worries that the Planning Officer’s report underestimated the likely impact on climate change; overestimated the benefit from fireclay and failed to properly protect local residents from noise and other impacts. The nearest homes are just 68m from the boundary of the extraction. The letter to the Planning Committee can be seen here.

Despite covid restrictions there have been numerous actions against this application this year. Cheeky supporters of the campaign dropped large banners from the High Level bridge in the City centre this week while pixies put out posters in bus shelters showing Banks Group’s real motivations. Check out the pictures.

Indigenous Leaders in Permanent Assembly Against Coal

PRESS RELEASE by NACIÓN WAYUU

Get Involved

Coal Roundup May 2021

Opencast coal extraction

Power Station Closures

Underground Mining

UK Steel producers

Want to help in the fight against coal?

References

Europe is Still Burning....

Lloyd's of London online rally - Safer spaces agreement

Lloyd's of London online rally - Safer spaces agreement

Get involved in fighting against the Cumbrian coal mine

“Nothing neutral in new coal” - youth activists pressure government to stop coking coal mine

“Nothing neutral in new coal” - youth activists pressure government to stop coking coal mine

Urgent youth virtual action

Key facts and figures on the West Cumbria Mining Project

What's been proposed?

What is coking coal?

Where would the coal go if it was extracted?

What's the process so far?

Why does this decision matter?

References

Disappointment as Government allows underground coking coal mine application to go ahead

Local campaigners save Dewley Hill from Banks Group's opencast plan