The last coal-fired power station in the UK is closing. This ends 142 years of coal power in the UK

LONDON – The UK’s last coal-fired power station closes on Monday, ending 142 years of coal-fired electricity in the country that launched the industrial revolution.

Ratcliffe-on-Soar station in central England ends its final shift at midnight, after more than half a century of converting coal into power. The UK government has hailed the closure of the plant as a significant milestone in its efforts to generate all of the UK’s energy from renewable sources by 2030.

Plant manager Peter O’Grady said it had been an “emotional day”.

“When I started my career 36 years ago, none of us could imagine a future without coal generation,” he said.

The closure makes Britain the first country in the Group of Seven major economies to phase out coal, although some other European countries, including Sweden and Belgium, have gotten there sooner.

Uniper’s owner says many of the 170 remaining employees will stay on during the two-year liquidation process.

Energy Minister Michael Shanks said the plant’s closure “marks the end of an era, and coal workers can rightly be proud of their work that has powered our country for more than 140 years. As a country, we owe generations a debt of gratitude.”

“The era of coal may be ending, but a new era of good energy jobs for our country is just beginning,” he said.

The world’s first coal-fired power station, Thomas Edison’s Edison Electric Light Station, opened in London in 1882.

Ratcliffe-on-Soar, opened in 1967, is a landmark whose eight concrete cooling towers and 199-meter (650-foot) chimney are seen every year by millions of people driving along the M1 motorway or on trains.

In 1990, coal provided around 80% of the UK’s electricity. According to National Grid data, by 2012 this figure had dropped to 39%, and by 2023 it was just 1%. More than half of the UK’s electricity now comes from renewable sources such as wind and solar power, with the remainder from natural gas and nuclear energy.

“Ten years ago, coal was the main source of energy in this country, producing a third of our electricity,” said Dhara Vyas, deputy chief executive of trade body Energy UK

“So to get to this point just a decade later, with coal input replaced by clean and low-carbon sources, is an incredible achievement,” Vyas said. “As we pursue further ambitious goals in the energy transition, it is worth remembering that few at the time thought that such a change at such a pace was possible.”

Coal fuels social conflicts and also fuels the country. In 1984, tens of thousands of miners left the mine due to plans by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government to close more than 20 coal mines. The strike lasted a year, divided communities and caused widespread violence in the form of clashes between police and pickets. The final defeat of the miners helped to break the power of British trade unions and hasten the end of the mining industry and the communities that depended on it.

Coal remains a combustible problem. Plans to open the UK’s first new coal mine in 30 years in northwest England have divided residents. Some welcomed the promise of well-paid jobs, while others balked at the pollution and greenhouse gas emissions it involved. On September 13, the High Court quashed the 2022 mine construction permit issued by the previous Conservative government.

Another chapter in Britain’s coal-burning industrial legacy ends on Monday with the closure of the last blast furnace at one of the world’s largest steelworks, in Port Talbot, Wales.

As a result of the closure of a factory belonging to the Indian concern Tata Steel, almost 2,000 employees will be dismissed. Tata plans to replace the blast furnace, which uses coal coke, with a cleaner electric furnace that will emit less carbon and require fewer workers.

At its peak in the 1960s, the Port Talbot steelworks employed more than 18,000 people before cheaper offers from China and elsewhere entered production.

Roy Rickhuss, general secretary of the union, said the closure “marks the end of an era, but it is not the end for Port Talbot”.

“We will never stop fighting for our steel industry and our communities in South Wales,” he said.