Coal mining in the United Kingdom
Coal mining in the United Kingdom dates back to Roman times and occurred in many different parts of the country.
Britain's coalfields are associated with Northumberland and Durham, North and South Wales, Yorkshire, the Scottish Central Belt, Lancashire, Cumbria, the East and West Midlands and Kent.
[3] Almost all onshore coal resources in the UK occur in rocks of the Carboniferous period, some of which extend under the North Sea.
[5] In 2020, the proposed Woodhouse Colliery gained planning permission but no works have begun, with legal challenges ongoing and no licence in place for seabed mining from the Marine Management Organisation.
[6] The United Kingdom's onshore coal resources occur in Carboniferous rocks, some of which extend under the North Sea.
[8] Britain's coalfields are associated with Northumberland and Durham, North and South Wales, Yorkshire, the Scottish Central Belt, Lancashire, Cumbria, the East and West Midlands and Kent.
Stone and Bronze Age flint axes have been discovered embedded in coal, showing that it was mined in Britain before the Roman invasion.
[11] In the 13th century there are records of coal digging in Durham[12] and Northumberland,[13] Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, Staffordshire, Lancashire, the Forest of Dean, Prestongrange in Lothian[14] and North[15] and South Wales.
Generally the seam continued underground, encouraging the settlers to dig to find coal, the precursor to modern operations.
[17] A key development was the invention at Coalbrookdale in the early 18th century of coke which could be used to make pig iron in the blast furnace.
The development of the steam locomotive by Trevithick early in the 19th century gave added impetus, and coal consumption grew rapidly as the railway network expanded through the Victorian period.
[18] At the beginning of the 19th century methods of coal extraction were primitive and the workforce – men, women, and children – laboured in dangerous conditions.
In early 1984, the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher announced plans to close 20 coal pits which led to the year-long miners' strike which ended in March 1985.
[42] The pit closures reflected coal consumption slumping to the lowest rate in more than a century, further declining towards the end of the 1980s and into the 1990s.
Hatfield Colliery closed in June 2015, as did Thoresby, and in December 2015, Kellingley, bringing to an end deep coal mining in the UK.
[46] The closure of coal mines left the affected communities economically deprived, unable to recover even in the long run.
[47] In 2020, the Woodhouse Colliery proposal gained planning permission but has outstanding legal challenges as of 2024 and as yet to begin any works.
The plan was criticised by some MPs and environmentalists due to the incompatibility of coal mining with government commitments to reduce carbon emissions.
[48][49][50] The decision to grant planning permission for Woodhouse Colliery was overturned by the High Court in September 2024, leaving the application to be re-determined by the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government at a later date.
