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New proposal for opencast mine at Brenkley Lane
THE county of Northumberland could become one of the most heavily mined regions in Europe, a new report suggests.
Research carried out by the Public Interest Research Centre, using freedom of information requests and council records, suggests Northumberland is likely to become the centre of coal mining in England, with plans to extract more than 20m tonnes of coal from some of the largest opencast mines in Europe.
This week The Banks Group said it had submitted proposals to Newcastle City Council and Northumberland County Council for a new opencast coal mine at Brenkley Lane, to the south of its existing site on the Blagdon Estate near Seaton Burn.
If approved the proposal would involve 2.4m tonnes of coal and 200,000 tonnes of fireclay being mined over a period of up to 11 years.
However the Brenkley Lane site is just one of eight potential sites in Northumberland identified for opencast operations.
UK Coal and The Banks Group have earmarked possible new mines near Ulgham, Widdrington and Acklington. New mines could also appear at Shilbottle and Alcan Farms.
The Banks Group has already started extracting coal from its latest site at Shotton, near Cramlington, while UK Coal has just received planning permission for a new mine at Potland Burn, Ashington.
In the past 18 months 14 companies have applied to dig nearly 60 million tonnes of coal from 58 new or enlarged opencast mines across the UK.
If all the applications are approved, the fastest expansion of UK coal mining in 40 years could see southern Scotland and Northumberland become two of the most heavily mined regions in Europe.
Richard Hawkins, of the Public Interest Research Centre, said: "There is a clear contradiction between the Government's 80 per cent target for climate change emissions cuts and investment in new coal.
"With industry and government saying carbon capture and storage is at least 20 years away, this shows that the 160m tonnes of carbon dioxide released by burning this coal would not be captured."
Steven Harrison, Managing Director at Banks Mining, said 40 jobs would be created on the 130-hectare site at Brenkley Lane.
He said the mine will use the existing Delhi site compound, facilities and overburden mound, maximising recovery of coal and reducing the visual and environmental impact.
If approved work could begin before the end of 2009.
"This area contains important coal reserves, and the proposal we have now submitted will allow them to be mined in an environmentally acceptable manner," said Mr Harrison.
"Coal will continue to play a major part in meeting both regional and national energy requirements for the foreseeable future, and this proposal would use existing facilities, innovative ways of working and world-leading technologies to both help meet this need and to minimise the impact on the local environment."
For further information about the Brenkley Lane proposal contact community liaison manager Bob Swainson on (01740) 658 500 or email brenkleylane@hjbanks.com.
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