Britain Achives First Day of Coal-Free Power in 135 Years
Peter Donnell / 8 years ago
British culture has revolved heavily around coal for well over a 100 years, for better and for worse. The first coal power plant went live back in 1882, and since then, we’ve been relying on this dirty power source extensively. However, efforts have been made to move away from coal power.
While we have had some spots where we’ve not used coal, such as in May 2016, when we managed to go just 19 hours without using it. Now we’ve reached a bigger milestone, with The National Grid confirming that on April 21st 2017, Britain went without coal-generated power for a full day; the first time in 135 years!
This is a huge achievement, but also just a tiny step in a much bigger solution to an even bigger problem. The milestone was achieved thanks to the growing range of alternative power sources in the country. Of course, gas is still being burnt, and nuclear options are still in use too, but there’s a lot more renewable energy being used too, and more so every year.
It’s far from going green, but with the UK planning to shut down the last coal plant by 2025, we welcome any progress towards that goal.
