All around us holes
Mining is an evocative subject. Tucked away, less that a mile from our little spot on a hill lies a slate mine. 500 yards away is another. A mile away is one of the largest slate mines still functioning in the UK. A couple of villages along from us lies a sci-fi landscape of craters and unnatural lumps and bumps. Remains of yet more mining that nature is now reclaiming.
That reclamation is, in the right light, both beautiful and uplifting. Given the chance nature will fight back. Here, within walking distance we see small trees sprouting at oblique angles from slag and spoil heaps. Lichen and moss grab footholds in crevices and cracks. Grass reclaims tracks. Animals, mostly small, start to find homes in the irregular nooks and crannies left behind by humans. On a sunny day it can be an almost optimistic experience walking around these relics of industrialisation.
No matter how nice these areas can become, or how much nature overwhelms the signs of human activity it doesn’t remove the cost of what has happened. The scars on the landscape remain, the carbon emitted during the process of extraction lingers on long after mining stops. Moss covered footpaths around spooky abandoned buildings doesn’t make that better.
Once upon a time these mines were the source of secure jobs for local men. But secure is not the same as ‘good’. The relationship local people have with these reminders of the past is complicated by the damage done to families who had men working there. Memories of illness, injury and worse linger on. There is no residual feeling of a new natural landscape to be celebrated amongst those who have been in the area for generations. The mines are something to be moved on from, even with the economic difficulties the loss of those jobs bought.
Just a little piece of history repeating
All of which moves us on from our area to Cumbria. As many of you will be aware there are plans to open a new coal mine in the county and only in the last week has the government finally called the planning application in for closer inspection. Announcing his decision, Robert Jenrick, the minister responsible, cited new climate evidence, including a report from the independent Committee for Climate Change. I’m sure the report is very good but the evidence linking the extraction of fossil fuels with the climate crisis is hardly breaking news.
Sometimes the obvious needs stating; we are living through a climate crisis caused by carbon emissions. Opening a new mine is madness.
Those behind the plans for the mine speak of the new jobs created in an area that often lacks them and the economic benefits that would accrue. It is true that the Cumbrian coast is an economically deprived area and well paid jobs are scarce. It seems harsh on the local population though to offer as an alternative to life in a nuclear power station, time in an open cast mine.
Local Conservative MP’s are angry at the government decision fearing the loss of former ‘red wall’ Labour voters who’s allegiance turned blue at the last election. Climate campaigners are delighted at the abrupt change in government feelings on the subject. The issue has become a flashpoint.
It’s a fair COP
This year the UK hosts the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow. Delayed from last year it is a key moment in checking on how countries are living up to their pledges made in Paris and in setting new tougher targets for the future. President Biden has appointed the former Secretary of State and Presidential nominee, John Kerry as his climate envoy and he is expected to showcase the U.S’s renewed commitment to multilateral environmental action by pushing hard for stiffer targets for all, including his own nation.
Britain’s delegation is headed by Alok Sharma, and he’s only been on the job full time for a couple of months. This is a major moment for climate diplomacy and for the newly Brexited UK to show it still deserves a place at the top table. Eight months beforehand and we have a middleweight minister in charge, a government climate policy of ten bullet points that could have been scribbled on the back of fag packet and the mind numbingly ridiculous optics of a summer spent waiting for a decision on opening our first coal mine in years which may unleash Tory civil war between the working class, values based voters of the North and their cousins in the southern shires.
You’d laugh if the whole planet wasn’t going up in smoke.
On top of all that, the coal the mine is to produce low quality coking coal. The government has stated (before it’s planning u-turn) that this was for domestic consumption. However, UK demand will be met with just 15% of the expected output. Not only are we willing to unleash stupidity on our own doorstep, we’re willing to export 85% of the consequences as well.
Sing from the Pulpit
Much of the power of government lies not in individual pieces of legislation but from the tone it sets, the optics it gives, the sermons set forth from that famous bully pulpit of leadership.
On climate change this really matters. This is an issue demanding action as individual, local, national and supra-national levels. The solutions to the challenge lie in both legislation and behavioural choices. The example set from the top really, really matters. A government with a detailed, long term, consistent climate policy that commands cross party support could make a massive difference to whether the UK gets itself back on track to meets its self imposed legal targets for emissions. (We’ve slipped off course over the last decade). Own goals like opening a new coal mine matter beyond the tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent attributable to that project. It matters for the signal it sends. It tells people that we can still hedge our bets, still have new mines, still fudge the issue and it will be ok.
It won’t. There is no cakeist outcome to the Climate Crisis. Leadership is needed, a clear message has to be sent. Create those jobs for Cumbria by committing to a massive program of retrofitting insulation to all existing homes in that county and every other. Coal mines, new and old, must bite the (coke) dust.