South Limburg coal mining basin

The demand for coal had grown explosively as a result of increased industrialization and urban expansion, but the national governments regarded any form of interference in the extraction and sale of this fuel as unnecessary.

In 1897 the Venlo-born priest parliamentarian Dr. Willem Nolens uttered in the Lower Chamber of the Dutch parliament the phrase that would eventually lead to the formation of the Limburg State Mines: "A country that does not know how to use its natural resources of wealth demonstrates that it is not worthy of them".

The twelve Limburg pits had together produced around 600 million tonnes of coal when the cabinet of Jo Cals decided to completely close down coal production in the province of Limburg, and the then minister of economic affairs, Joop den Uyl, decided to make a personal visit to the mining centre of Heerlen to announce his decision.

A natural gas field had been discovered in the province of Groningen, a gigantic reservoir of clean energy that would be much cheaper to exploit than coal from Limburg, which by then had to be fetched to the surface from a depth of over 800 metres.

The Juliana Canal was constructed for this purpose in the years 1925-1936, and in the same period a 13 kilometer long railway line was built between Schaesberg and Simpelveld to cater for daily passenger traffic.

Mine management began to build houses for their workforce at an early stage, so that mineworker colonies arose, such as that at Lutterade near Geleen.

Dr. Poels, who was a member of one of the leading families of "De Grote Compagnie" in Venray, thereby laid the foundations for a social structure in which all the various population groups were integrated, and it was he who stood up for the material rights of the miners.

He stimulated the formation of interest groups based on the 'harmony' model, and although this cooperative union between capital and labour found little or no resonance elsewhere in the Netherlands, it was to some degree responsible for the fact that the government-initiated mine closures in and after 1965 did not result in any significant social or political conflict.

The mines had resulted in the creation of supply industries and an infrastructure of roads, railways and waterways, mainly aimed at the transportation of coal within the Netherlands and abroad.

As Queen's Commissioner, Dr. Kremers conducted an active economic policy to reduce the effects of the mine closures and to push back unemployment.