NEW DELHI: After spearheading the coal-powered industrial revolution over 250 years ago, the United Kingdom officially closed its last coal-fired power plant, Ratcliffe-on-Soar station in Central England on October 1, marking the end of coal use to generate electricity in the country. With this, the UK became the first country among the group of richest countries, G7, to formally end its reliance on coal to produce electricity.
The last power station was Ratcliffe-on-Soar, set up around 60 years ago.
UK’s Energy Minister Michael Shanks said a new age of good energy jobs for the country has just begun, while Jennifer Layke, Global Director, Energy, World Resources Institute (WRI), said the UK’s coal power phaseout sets a strong example for others and marks a significant step in eliminating coal use entirely.
Coal powered Britain's Industrial Revolution
Coal, a natural resource, transformed the UK into global imperial power by plundering its huge colonies in Asia and Africa. However, the colonies slid into a deep hole of poverty and destitution, many of which yet to come out of.
According to Oxford Research papers, the early Industrial Revolution started around the 1750s and was mostly confined to Britain. It spread to other parts of Europe after the 1830s. Coal and iron were the most important raw materials to drive the industrial revolution. Coal was used to fuel machines to give shape to iron and locomotives, and to heat water for steam engines.
Coal has since transformed the planet like never before. It triggered a cultural and economic shift from home-based production, traditional agriculture, and manual labour to a system of factory-based manufacturing that included complex machinery.
The invention of the steam engine further increased the demand for coal. Steam engine technology also helped in deeper mechanised mining to remove water at the bottom of mines. Moreover, improved steam engines powered weaving and spinning mills, which led to the spread of large scale textiles factories and mills across England.
Most importantly, it powered other modes of transport, such as trains and ships, which helped Britain control its colonies, and gave free access to the resources it needed to expand industrialisation on a large scale.
The East India Company found the first coal reserve in India in 1774 in the Raniganj Coalfield in Bengal. Ethora in Asansol district was the first village where commercial coal extraction was attempted by the company.
However, the British started using coal as domestic fuel in the 16th century as wood supply faced constraints. They found their first coal mine in 1575 in England.
Contribution to historical emission and climate change
The fast adoption of coal over wood was because of higher yields of energy per unit mass. Also, it is portable to areas where woods were scarce like in the cities. Energy was used in smelting and alloy production and later electricity generation. Britain had set up its first coal-fired power plant in 1882 to generate electricity.
On the flip side, large-scale burning of coal emitted humongous greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen oxide, and sulphur dioxide, which contributed to climate change. According to Our World In Data research, since 1751 the world has emitted over 1.5 trillion tonnes of CO2. Up until 1950, more than half of the historical CO2 emissions were by Europe. However, until 1882, more than half of the world’s cumulative emissions came from the UK alone.
Over the century that followed, industrialisation in the US rapidly increased its contribution of greenhouse gases. It’s only over the past 50 years that growth in South America, Asia and Africa increased their share of the global pollution.
Asia and Africa trapped under coal
Colonies, especially in Asia and Africa, which provided free access to coal to run the imperialist industries, find themselves trapped in their own coal economy. The then imperialist powers - now the richest on the planet - have since developed clean technologies and discovered other sources of energy over time. They then started lobbying for the phase out of coal so as to limit the average global temperature rise to 2°C as compared to the pre-industrial phase. According to WRI, the world needs to reduce coal use from 36% of power generation in 2022 to 4% by 2030 so as to stay within the 1.5°C temperature rise goal set by the Paris Agreement.
Industries in Asia and Africa depend on their own coal as their primary source of energy. These countries need cheaper and home grown energy to develop their domestic industry. It puts them in a dilemma as developed countries are reluctant to share new clean technology. Moreover, a large number of communities depend on coal for their livelihood, which makes the transition difficult.
Asia and Africa want countries that added most of the CO2 in the atmosphere resulting in global warming, to take greater responsibility in reducing greenhouse gas. For example, the US, responsible for 25% of historical emissions, has emitted over 400 billion tonnes of CO2 since 1751 whereas the whole of Asia contributed slightly higher than this - led by Japan and China. India and Brazil are not large contributors historically. They started contributing in the past three decades only to give push to their industrialisation.
Phase-out timeline
According to reports, Italy has planned to shut down its last coal-fired power plant by next year; France will do so in 2027; Canada in 2030; and Germany in 2038. Japan and the United States have not set any dates.
At present, India and China account for about 80% of all active coal fired power projects globally. Both countries have not set any timeline to phase out coal projects citing low-per capita emissions, surging renewable energy sources and demand for cheaper fuel sources. India has slightly reduced its share of coal in power production from 74.37% in 2019 to 73% by 2023.
China pledged to reduce coal consumption between 2026 and 2030 but has not committed to a full phaseout.
Experts believe the success of global coal phase-out hinges on India and China. But there is no clarity on how to rehabilitate the millions of people involved in the coal industry whenever the transition takes place. According to WRI, India has over 1.4 million mine workers (almost double the population of Luxemburg) and 6,00,000 coal power plant workers whereas China has 3.4 million coal miners and 7,40,000 power plant workers.
