Is the sun setting on the age of fossil fuels? Image: Flickr/[Duncan]
Later today, Welsh politicians will debate something amazing: the prospect that their country could be the first in the world to go fossil free. This afternoon, Welsh Assembly Members will vote on a cross-party motion for a moratorium on opencast coal. Since the Welsh government already supports a moratorium on fracking, this motion – if it passes – would effectively mean Wales ceasing all new fossil fuel extraction.
This would be truly historic. Welsh coal from the valleys powered the industrial revolution, defined communities and shaped Welsh identity for generations. Today, with most deep coalmines long since closed, opencast coal employs few people, yet continues to scar the Welsh landscape. Take Merthyr Tydfil in the valleys of south Wales, home to the vast Ffos-y-fran opencast pit. The pit is in operation some 16 hours per day, a vast open sore barely forty yards from some people’s homes. The coal dust clings to every surface and clogs residents’ lungs. Its total expected production of 10 million tonnes of coal will result in carbon emissions equivalent to the sustainable average of 25 million people. Local campaigners have fought against the development for over a decade.
Eight years ago now, George Monbiot pointed to the opencast coal mine at Merthyr Tydfil as evidence of a fundamental contradiction in UK climate change policy. How was it, he reasoned, that our government could claim to be tackling carbon emissions, yet continue to dig up more fossil fuels at the same time?
