tgbcvr Wrote:
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> There’s an editorial in the Oct 2020 Narrow
> Gauge World, entitled “The Biggest Threat To Our
> Future”, where unthinkably there is a looming
> shortage of locomotive quality coal in the UK. To
> paraphrase, the very last mine producing washed
> bituminous lump coal closed in August, and on Sept
> 8 a proposal for a new mine was turned down
> (Eco-warriors/politicians wishing to be seen to be
> “doing something”). The UK will still use 5
> million tonnes of coal/year for steel and cement
> making anyway, but those big operations will just
> import it from Russia or the USA. If there’s no
> new domestic sources, steam heritage lines would
> themselves need to team up and ship coal in from
> elsewhere at great additional cost, (combined they
> use just 26k tonnes/year - not even one ship load)
> and then figure out how to distribute it between
> them. Or..... convert to oil. Scary thought for
> the UK preservation sector.
I was just going to post the same thing. I understand that the UK has closed the last coal burning power plant in the county. I understand that heritage steam in the UK is excluded from any ban on coal burning (I expect that it will be in the USA as well), but that is cold comfort if there isn't enough demand to make running a mine profitable. And remember that not all coal is created equal, "coal" may still be available, but if it isn't "steam coal", it isn't going to do us much good.
I expect that we have all seen the little kids mock coughing and gagging the moment a puff of smoke blows in their direction. They will be growing up soon, and I expect they will avoid coal burning tourist RR's due to not wanting to support "a dirty polluter".
For the times they are a'changin'.