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The only reason why coal fired plants could be phased out is that the base load from industry is gone. For example the UK last month produced 515,000 tons of s

by konjin 6y ago

The only reason why coal fired plants could be phased out is that the base load from industry is gone. For example the UK last month produced 515,000 tons of steel. In the 1890s it produced 420,000 tons per month. The title might as well be "UK De-Industrialization Complete". [1] https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201516/cmselect/cmbis/546/54604.htm https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201516/cmselect/cmbi... [2] https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/steel-production https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/steel-production

frereubu 6y ago
Fair point, but that's not the only reason. Coal-fired stations have been replaced with gas ones, which aren't ideal, but are clearly better. Renewable energy has increased quite a bit, albeit from a low base and not nearly fast enough. My quibble is that people are entirely writing this off because it's not enough, and I don't think that's helpful. We need to take some satisfaction when things are going in the right direction, even if it's not enough yet. It's like a boss whose only method of motivating people is to constantly point out deficiencies in someone's work, rather than giving balanced feedback and praising them where it's due.
arethuza 6y ago
I'm surprised to see that UK steel production actually peaked in the late 1960s.
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  Why? That was the end of the Empire and when Britain shifted course.
  - arethuza 6y ago
    No good reason :-)
tialaramex 6y ago
> The only reason why coal fired plants could be phased out is that the base load from industry is gone. Nope. The whole point of electricity is that you don't need to care. When a gas plant comes on line - producing cheaper and cleaner power - it doesn't change anything about the actual electricity used in industry or how they use it. If Britain needed 50GW of baseline power for a North covered in manufacturing plants in 2020, it would buy more gas power plants and maybe wind farms - not coal because coal is too expensive.
- konjin 6y ago
  Gas is cheap because there isn't demand for it, energy generation has one of the most inelastic supply curves under a decade of any industry. If the UK was still producing steel at the level it was in 1960 it would require up to 10% of the total current electricity production to meed the demand of the sector [1] [2]. That's just one industry. The UK's electricity demand has fallen over 20% since the peak in 2000 [3]. The other reason why coal is no longer a good deal for the UK is that Thatcher wanted to crush organized labour in the mines, managed to do it and then found that trying to import coal from Australia was a losing proposition. Had British industry not been stabbed in the back by the Tories we'd be looking at new plants which would be a mix on coal and gas and maybe if the greens could have been kept at bay nuclear, but old plants will still be open because they could make money. [1] http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2016/ph240/martelaro1/ http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2016/ph240/martelaro1/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_Kingdom [3] https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-primary-energy-use-in-2018-was-the-lowest-in-half-a-century/uk-electricity-generation-by-source-terwatt-hours-1996-2018-shares-of-uk-electricity-generation-percentage-2 https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-primary-energy-use-i...
pjc50 6y ago
This gets brought up a lot, but what it reflects is the exhaustion of mine deposits more than anything else. The UK steel industry's locations were determined by the availability of coal and iron ore, because they are bulky and heavy and more expensive to ship than finished steel. UK iron mining ended in the 80s and the remaining steel mills work on imported ore. > "Domestic metal extraction is currently restrict-ed to three locations: a small gold mine near Omagh in Northern Ireland; the Cavendish Mill in the Southern Pennine Orefield (SPO) in Derbyshire where about 1200 tonnes of smelter-grade lead sulfide is extracted per annum as a by-product of fluorspar mining; and a major new tungsten mine at Hemerdon near Plymouth where the first deliveries of tungsten concentrate took place in the third quarter of 2015. This mine will be one of the largest pro-ducers of tungsten in the West when it reaches full production." (BGS mineral planning factsheet 2015) The tungsten mine is a classic mining story, it seems to have gone in and out of business depending on market fluctuations: https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/new-owner-plymouths-tungsten-mine-3637517 https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/new-owne... It's also really sparse: "Exploration by Amax in the early 1980s identified a resource of 42 million tonnes at 0.18% WO3 (tungsten trioxide) and 0.025% Sn (tin)." (BGS)

by konjin 6y ago

frereubu 6y ago

Fair point, but that's not the only reason. Coal-fired stations have been replaced with gas ones, which aren't ideal, but are clearly better. Renewable energy has increased quite a bit, albeit from a low base and not nearly fast enough. My quibble is that people are entirely writing this off because it's not enough, and I don't think that's helpful. We need to take some satisfaction when things are going in the right direction, even if it's not enough yet. It's like a boss whose only method of motivating people is to constantly point out deficiencies in someone's work, rather than giving balanced feedback and praising them where it's due.

arethuza 6y ago

I'm surprised to see that UK steel production actually peaked in the late 1960s.

chrisseaton 6y ago
Why? That was the end of the Empire and when Britain shifted course.
- arethuza 6y ago
  No good reason :-)

tialaramex 6y ago

> The only reason why coal fired plants could be phased out is that the base load from industry is gone. Nope. The whole point of electricity is that you don't need to care. When a gas plant comes on line - producing cheaper and cleaner power - it doesn't change anything about the actual electricity used in industry or how they use it. If Britain needed 50GW of baseline power for a North covered in manufacturing plants in 2020, it would buy more gas power plants and maybe wind farms - not coal because coal is too expensive.

konjin 6y ago
Gas is cheap because there isn't demand for it, energy generation has one of the most inelastic supply curves under a decade of any industry. If the UK was still producing steel at the level it was in 1960 it would require up to 10% of the total current electricity production to meed the demand of the sector [1] [2]. That's just one industry. The UK's electricity demand has fallen over 20% since the peak in 2000 [3]. The other reason why coal is no longer a good deal for the UK is that Thatcher wanted to crush organized labour in the mines, managed to do it and then found that trying to import coal from Australia was a losing proposition. Had British industry not been stabbed in the back by the Tories we'd be looking at new plants which would be a mix on coal and gas and maybe if the greens could have been kept at bay nuclear, but old plants will still be open because they could make money. [1] http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2016/ph240/martelaro1/ http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2016/ph240/martelaro1/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_Kingdom [3] https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-primary-energy-use-in-2018-was-the-lowest-in-half-a-century/uk-electricity-generation-by-source-terwatt-hours-1996-2018-shares-of-uk-electricity-generation-percentage-2 https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-primary-energy-use-i...

pjc50 6y ago

This gets brought up a lot, but what it reflects is the exhaustion of mine deposits more than anything else. The UK steel industry's locations were determined by the availability of coal and iron ore, because they are bulky and heavy and more expensive to ship than finished steel. UK iron mining ended in the 80s and the remaining steel mills work on imported ore. > "Domestic metal extraction is currently restrict-ed to three locations: a small gold mine near Omagh in Northern Ireland; the Cavendish Mill in the Southern Pennine Orefield (SPO) in Derbyshire where about 1200 tonnes of smelter-grade lead sulfide is extracted per annum as a by-product of fluorspar mining; and a major new tungsten mine at Hemerdon near Plymouth where the first deliveries of tungsten concentrate took place in the third quarter of 2015. This mine will be one of the largest pro-ducers of tungsten in the West when it reaches full production." (BGS mineral planning factsheet 2015) The tungsten mine is a classic mining story, it seems to have gone in and out of business depending on market fluctuations: https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/new-owner-plymouths-tungsten-mine-3637517 https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/new-owne... It's also really sparse: "Exploration by Amax in the early 1980s identified a resource of 42 million tonnes at 0.18% WO3 (tungsten trioxide) and 0.025% Sn (tin)." (BGS)