This plan was met with massive protests in the autumn of 2018 and was temporarily stopped in October 2018 by the supreme administrative court of North Rhine–Westphalia (Oberverwaltungsgericht für das Land Nordrhein-Westfalen).

The lignite was created from extensive forests and bogs, which developed in the Lower Rhine Bay between thirty and five million years ago.

The geology of the Lower Rhine Bay is characterized by long-lasting subsidence movements in the last thirty million years, which led to the deposition of up to 1,300 m-thick sediment layers through the North Sea and many rivers.

The overburden was, until 16 April 2009, partially transported by conveyor belt to the Bergheim mine, which has run out of coal and therefore been refilled and recultivated.

The visible mark of the open pit is the Sophienhöhe spoil tip, which is considered to be the largest human-made hill, towering over the flat landscape by 200 metres.

The A4 motorway and the Hambach industrial spur, by which the lignite is transported to the power stations, were laid around three kilometres to the south, parallel to the Cologne-Aachen railway line.

Due to the accumulation of about 1 km3 of material at the Sophienhöhe and the extracted coal, a residual hole was created, which is set to be filled with water after the completion of mining activities.

[12] Andreas Pinkwart, Minister for Economic Affairs, Innovation, Digitisation and Energy of North Rhine-Westphalia, also expressed his support for the project.

They flew over the open pit with a hot air balloon, occupied an excavator for several days, and painted it partly pink.

On 13 May 2009, the joint activity of the local action group of citizens' initiatives against the relocation of the A4 and Friends of the Earth Germany (BUND) failed before the Federal Administrative Court.

The plaintiffs tried to stop the relocation of the A4, which was deemed necessary for the planned extension of the open-pit mine and justified this, inter alia, with feared noise pollution, as well as the possible threat to the protected Bechstein bat and other species.

The newly formed brown coal committee therefore decided on 16 April 2010 to set up the Bergschaden Braunkohle NRW reclamation service for damage victims in the Rhenish lignite mining area.

[15] In November 2012 and March 2013, the police cleared tent and hut camps of mining opponents in the remaining Hambach Forest.