Regional focus
Under fi re
– and blighting landscapes down on earth – much of the developed world has cast them aside. But with proposals for a new coal mine in west Cumbria being considered, could this historic mining region soon witness a heavy industry renaissance? Andrea Valentino talks to fi gures on both sides of the debate to explore whether the new Whitehaven facility could offer hope in a benighted corner of England, what it could mean for the environment – and whether it could herald a broader rethink in how mines go about their business.
Of all our environmental bogeymen, arguably none are as threatening as coal mines. Filling the atmosphere with CO2
of the UN General Assembly. His hair ruffled, his white shirt ever so slightly creased, Boris Johnson announced that now was the moment for humanity to “grow up” in its fight against climate change. “The adolescence of humanity,” he proclaimed, “is coming to an end”. To prove his point, amid the obligatory references to Greek
O 8
n 22 September 2021, the famous green tiles to his back, the UK prime minister recently made a typically vivid speech from the dais
classical mythology, Johnson praised the wind farms now sprouting up in the North Sea – before returning to safer ground with a joke about Kermit the Frog. Whatever his idiosyncrasies, Johnson is certainly right to praise his country’s environmental revolution. In 2020, renewables provided up to 43% of the UK’s energy needs, while fossil fuels fell to a record low of 37%. Yet even as Johnson visited New York, exhorting his fellow leaders to put childish
World Mining Frontiers /
www.nsenergybusiness.com
schankz /
Shutterstock.com
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45
