PM’s commitment to green targets questioned as top climate adviser calls decision ‘absolutely indefensible’
Opening a new coalmine when the world stands on the brink of climate catastrophe is “absolutely indefensible”, in the words of the UK government’s independent climate adviser, the chair of the Climate Change Committee and the former Conservative minister Lord Deben.
The £165m mine in Cumbria will produce coking coal for steelmaking, which the government has said will still be needed, even though steelmakers must move to low-carbon production in the next 13 years. Two of the UK’s existing steel companies have rejected the new coal, which means much of it will be exported to a world already awash with fossil fuels.