East Midlands

Could King Coal be about to make a comeback in our backyard?

Former miner Les Raine agreed to accept Inside Out's challenge to investigate.

What he discovered is that the East Midlands is at the heart of decisions which are beginning to shape our energy future.

When coal ruled...

Les worked on the coalface at Ollerton colliery in North Nottinghamshire from 1979 until it closed in 1994.

Back then British coal was seen as uneconomic to mine in the face of cheap imports and cheaper gas.

But a lot has changed in the world of energy in the past 14 years.

At the pit head - Harworth Colliery.

UK Coal's Chief Executive, Jon Lloyd, calls it a seismic shift in world energy prices.

It has meant that the price of coal has shot up in line with oil and gas.

For the first time the company is looking at reopening a deep mine, Harworth colliery in Nottinghamshire, which went into mothballs in 2006.

And seams which were previously too geologically difficult to mine are now being explored further.

Black gold

The scientists at British Geological Survey in Keyworth outside Nottingham are world experts in mineral reserves.

Core storage at BGS.

Their geological maps show that there are still millions of tons of coal underneath the East Midlands, much of it fairly near the surface in the west of the region.

It's still very expensive to reach the eastern coal - new deep mines can cost a billion pounds each.

So any new coal is likely to come from surface mining.

<See the British Geological survey's research on coal here…>

But surface mining is often unpopular with communities.

Eco-warriors

At Smalley in Derbyshire, UK Coal plans extract up to a million tons.

But they ran up against opposition on two fronts - from eco-warriors who camped out on site, and from a local action group worried about the environmental impact on wildlife and their village.

Initially Derbyshire County Council refused planning permission for the site but they were over-ruled by the Government who are concerned about Britain's reliance on imported energy.

Eco-warriors protest against mining.

Peter Nelson who campaigns for "Leave it in the Ground" told us that protestors weren't only concerned about the greenhouse gases from burning coal.

"The main issue for me is UK Coal want to come and take all of the coal out of here as quickly and cheaply as possible so it can be burned as soon as possible so they can make profits now.

"I don't think that represents the interests of people in general."

Local voices

Rachel Severnes who used to rent Lodge House from UK Coal felt local voices weren't heard.

"We're a small community trying to save this beautiful countryside and the Government's got involved and over-ridden Derbyshire County Council.

"The Government's not listening to anything that the council want or the local people."

Power battle - Ratcliffe power station.

UK Coal say they'll take steps to protect wildlife, and when the site is restored, it will be a better habitat and local amenity than before.

For Les the issue of energy security versus environmental concerns is a tricky balance.

Coal fired power station Ratcliffe on Soar keeps the lights on for a million and a half people, but it burns 812 tonnes of coal an hour.

It is responsible for more than eight million of tonnes of carbon dioxide every year.

Cleaner energy

The East Midlands is helping to lead the way in helping coal clean up its act with research into carbon dioxide storage.

At the pit bottom with Les Raine.

Head of Energy at BGS Mike Stephenson showed Les how the Norwegians are already burying CO2 at an underground storage site under the North Sea.

So far nothing has leaked.

But he warned the technology is still experimental and we're still 10 to 15 years away from implementing it on a large scale.

"It's not a panacea. But it might buy us time to develop renewables to give us the electricity we need."

But opinion remains divided on whether reinvesting in coal is the right way forward...