Trog
Established Member
As oil and gas run out as they eventually will, coal will become more important again, and there will probably be a revival in UK mining.
But I doubt it will ever be what it was, as Nuclear and renewable energy are cleaner alternatives. But even if not used on a large scale for fuel, coal will be important as a source of hydo-carbons for the chemical production of substitutes for things that still require what are now oil based products and for the manufacture of things like plastics.
In the long view it may turn out to have been a wise move to burn other peoples coal while it was cheap, leaving ours in the ground gaining value. Much British Coal was deep mined, an expensive way of extracting coal, which will make more sense as the product rises in value.
These days the world is basically one in terms of economy so except in the short term there is no point in subsidising a loss making industry, whose product can be obtained cheaper elsewhere. As the raised costs and taxation will only make other industries less competitive and move the job losses there instead.
Given the above the contraction of the British Coal industry was inevitable, you just can not carry on producing something for which there is no economic market. Even if we had had an unbroken run of Labour governments sooner or later one of them would have had to say enough is enough.
But I doubt it will ever be what it was, as Nuclear and renewable energy are cleaner alternatives. But even if not used on a large scale for fuel, coal will be important as a source of hydo-carbons for the chemical production of substitutes for things that still require what are now oil based products and for the manufacture of things like plastics.
In the long view it may turn out to have been a wise move to burn other peoples coal while it was cheap, leaving ours in the ground gaining value. Much British Coal was deep mined, an expensive way of extracting coal, which will make more sense as the product rises in value.
These days the world is basically one in terms of economy so except in the short term there is no point in subsidising a loss making industry, whose product can be obtained cheaper elsewhere. As the raised costs and taxation will only make other industries less competitive and move the job losses there instead.
Given the above the contraction of the British Coal industry was inevitable, you just can not carry on producing something for which there is no economic market. Even if we had had an unbroken run of Labour governments sooner or later one of them would have had to say enough is enough.
