Britain's Resources of Coal and Spent Uranium Fuel
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Nature Vol. 296 29 April 1982 797 Britain's resources of coal and spent uranium fuel Robert Olby* n-IE United Kingdom is often described as as much as 50 x 109 tonnes of coal, more, rate of expansion of coal extraction of the a favoured nation in an increasingly he declared than Britain's total coal first half of that century (800 per cent). energy-hungry world - possessing riches reserves which, according to the National Such a drain on the country's "life-blood" of coal, and also North Sea oil and gas and Coal Board in 1969 were about 20 x 1()9 would exhaust its resources by AD 2034. On an abundance of spent fuel from nuclear tonnes. In 1976 Sir John's colleague T.N. the other hand, if, as Edward Hull reactors. Before the OPEC oil price rise of Marsham gave the more conservative coal believed, the coal industry would be 1973 it was generally accepted that equivalent of stored spent fuel as 20 x 109 incapable of raising more than 100 million dependence on coal should continue to tonnes, which Sir John later doubled to tons per annum, the nation still had eight decline in favour of oil and nuclear power. 40 x 109 tonnes a year. Between these two centuries of supplies. Meanwhile he looked The imposition of a fuel tax on oil in 1961 values came the Coal Board's new estimate to science to show how we could win energy marked an attempt to slow down the rate of of Britain's coal reserves at a little more from "the light and heat that is everywhere oil substitution, but nevertheless between than twice T.N. Marsham's figure. around us". Appealing to God's provi- 1959 and 1973 oil consumption more than doubled, and by 1973, 3 per cent of total primary energy was supplied by nuclear During the 1970s estimates of the United Kingdom's reserves of coal and spent power. The action of OPEC not only fuel from nuclear reactors, provided by the National Coal Board and Atomic strengthened the argument for nuclear Energy Authority respectively, have tended to steadily increase. It is tempting to power based on its contribution to national infer a connection between these estimates and the efforts of the NCB and AEA security but within the National Coal to promote their claims on government finance, by each predicting as long-lived Board it brought to the fore the already active concern to reassess the future of a future secure energy source as its rival. This article follows the history of the coal. various estimates and attempts to assess their credibility. In the board's Plan for Coal (1974), investment of £1,400 million over the following decade was proposed, £8 Dwindling resource dential character he assured his readers: million, of which was to be spent on an Although the long-term future of coal as "nor can we suppose that any part of the intensified programme of exploration to the United Kingdom's chief energy source Creator's universe has been regulated on so decide on the best sites for future was a matter for concern after the Second short-sighted a plan, that it shall become development. Three years later, this World War, the subject had long been disorganized because some of the elements expansionist mood became apparent to all debated. ln 1789 John Williams discussed necessary to its economy have failed". with the announcement of the board's the •'limited quantity of coal in Britain'' in The optimism of Edward Hull was revised estimates of the United Kingdom's his book Natural History of the Mineral matched by the stern realism of the "physically recoverable" reserves. To a Kingdom, and in the 1810 edition edited by economist and statistician, W. Stanley British Association audience the then-chief James Miller, Macnab's 1792 estimate of Jevons. In his celebrated work, The Coal geologist to the board, A. Michael Clarke, 360 years' supply was given. This figure Question (1865) he calculated the duration declared that economics and a lack of related only to the coalfields of of British coal on the basis of Hull's sufficient physically recoverable reserves Northumberland and Durham and the estimate of reserves and the extrapolation of coal were not the sole determinants of extraction rates of that period. In the into the future of the historic trend in coal the choice between coal and nuclear future nineteenth century the Oxford geologist, consumption, which had been 3.40Jo per bulk energy supplies for Britain and William Buckland, urged upon the annum over the decade 1851-61 . His Europe. Just because the era of cheap oil parliamentary committees of 1830 and conclusion was that: "Rather more than a had taken an unnecessary slice from the life 1835 the need to conserve coal. In 1830 the century of our present progress would of UK coal reserves, it was not the case that old sea-coal tax had been abolished, but exhaust our mines to the depth of 4,000 feet in the long-term we lacked adequate twelve years later Sir Robert Peel put a ... "Jevons was widely misunderstood as reserves. To go nuclear, he declared, was tariff on all exported coal. predicting exhaustion around the year not therefore inevitable. The subject of coal resources came 1975, whereas he was really trying to show The United Kingdom's reserves, which before Parliament once again when the that the nation's industrial expansion the World Energy Conference Survey of Commercial Treaty with France was could not continue for long at the rate then Energy Resources for the reference year debated in 1860. According to Article 11, current. Whilst there was still plentiful 1975 (published 1977) had shown as no duty was to be levied upon coal exported cheap coal attempts should be made to 3.887 x 109 tonnes, were now claimed by to France and other nations with whom the reduce the national debt, introduce a the board to be 45 x 109 tonnes. Small United Kingdom was at peace. It was the general system of education, and impose a wonder that this apparent dramatic change discussion of this treaty which caused far more general restriction on child caused adverse comment from the Edward Hull, member of the Geological labour. Such tasks would be more difficult Institution of Geological Sciences (IGS), Survey, to write The Coalfields of Britain to achieve when other countries reached letters in The Times and a tart editorial in (1860) in which he took a sanguine view. and surpassed the output of Britain's Nature. Introducing the mining limit of a depth of mines, becoming more competitive in In 1975 Sir John Hill, chairman of the 4,000 feet he reckoned England and Wales world markets (by 1%7 US pithead prices Atomic Energy Authority, drew attention had just under 59 x 109 tons, enough for were half those of Britain). Although to the potential energy source available in about a thousand years. In the second J evons foresaw this situation he could not, spent uranium fuel. With the fast reactor, edition of 1862 Hull included the Scottish as a free-trader, recommend the imposition he claimed, Britain's spent fuel could yield coalfields which raised his estimate to of an export tariff on coal. Therefore it was •The University of Leeds Department of Philosophy, Leeds LS2 79.8 x 109 tons. Hull recoiled from the clear to him that the cost of coal extraction 9JT, UK. implications of continuing indefinitely the was a decisive factor in determining the 0028-0836/82/170797 .OS$01.00 tC> 1982 Macmillan Journals Ltd 798 Nature Vol. 296 29 April 1982 proportion of Britain's total coal resources advantageous position in regard to coal nization output had not grown as it had in which would be extracted. In the future we supplies, coal imports would become the continental mines. This was chiefly due to might, indeed, be able to mine coal at rule rather than the exception. Ominously the winding and undulating character of greater depths than at present, but only if the report concluded with the sentence: the underground lay-outs ("in-seam the price was competitive in world markets. "But it may well be doubted whether the mining") in Britain in contrast to the There was no question of the physical manufacturing supremacy of this kingdom straight roads which were driven through exhaustion of our coalfields- "though we can be maintained after the importation of the strata on the continent ("horizon may some day have to pay dear for fuel; it coal has become a necessity." These views mining"). The latter layout was easier to will never be positively wanting", he were not substantially revised by the Royal mechanize throughout. In Britain the work explained in the second edition of The Coal Commission of 1901, nor by anyone else. of the coal-filler at the end of the conveyor Question. Here Jevons was expressing Like their 1871 predecessors, the 1901 belt remained unmechanized and what later became a major feature of the commissioners misunderstood J evons. constituted the bottle neck in the system distinction between reserves and resources, They arrived at an estimate of total until the 1960s. the history of which is recounted below. available coal to 4,000 feet of nearly Although Britain did not suffer so Jevons drove his point home by a 142 x 1Q9 tons, 40.7 x 109 tons being in acutely after the Second World War as demonstration of the unique character of "unproved" coalfields.