How West Cumbria’s coal links to Turkey
How West Cumbria’s coal links to Turkey
In Spring 2024, Coal Action Network investigators visited Turkey to see first-hand the impacts that imported coal was having on communities living near steelworks and power stations using coal.
At that time, planning permission was in place for West Cumbria Mining Ltd to extract 2.78 million tonnes of coal a year, until 2049, from a coal mine under the sea near Whitehaven, Cumbria, UK.
The majority of the coal from Whitehaven would have been for export. However, the coal from Whitehaven has a high sulphur content, meaning European Union countries can’t use this coal in their blast furnaces due to air pollution standards and the UK blast furnaces will be replaced by Electric Arc Furnaces, to recycle scrap steel instead.
Therefore, of the countries listed by West Cumbria Mining Ltd as potential markets, only Turkey would have been a viable option.
Although the coal was considered to be coking coal, its actual end use would have depended on who bought it. Coking coal is a higher quality product, normally too expensive for power stations to use, but with its high sulphur content reducing price, Cumbrian coal could have been bought by Turkish power stations.
Update on the proposed Whitehaven coal mine
Shortly after our visit to Turkey, a General Election was announced in the UK. The victory by the Labour party, pushed out the Conservative Government which had approved the new coal mine in Whitehaven in December 2022.
Less than a month after the new Labour Government was formed, a court case was heard that had been brought by South Lakes Action on Climate Change and Friends of the Earth against the previous Conservative Government’s approval of the coal mine. The new Labour Government decided not to defend the previous Government’s decision to approve the coal mine. The Judge removed the planning permission for the coal mine in September 2024.
This momentous decision was reinforced by the Coal Authority subsequently declining the license application for the coal mine. There remains a final decision from the Labour Government regarding the application, but it is considered very unlikely to win the required permissions now.
We’re publishing this article on Turkey’s coal use because of the generous help that we received from Turkish people during our investigation, although it is no longer part of an active UK campaign.
