Back in 1882, Queen Victoria was on the throne, Tottenham Hotspur was founded, the Royal Courts of Justice were opened, and the Holborn Viaduct power station was built.
The power station became the first coal-fired public electricity generating station in the world.
Since that day, the UK has almost continuously used coal to generate electricity which, we now know, is a major contributing factor to climate change. That was until two years ago, when the UK managed to go an entire day without using coal for electricity for the first time since the power station opened. Now, the UK has managed to generate electricity for an entire week without coal for the very first time in 137 years.
The last coal generator came off the system at around 1.30pm on 1 May 2019, and the generator was still off the system at the same time on 8 May 2019. Most of the electricity generated during that time came from gas turbines (45%), nuclear plants (21%), wind (11%), solar (6%) biomass (6%) and hydro (1%), with a further 10% of energy coming from imports.
With the Government pledging to phase out coal-fired power by 2025, and with a potential climate catastrophe waiting for us in the relatively near future, weeks like these are going to be essential in promoting the importance of cleaner and more renewable energy sources.
Fintan Slye, director of National Grid ESO, said, "Zero-carbon operation of the electricity system by 2025 means a fundamental change to how our system was designed to operate – integrating newer technologies right across the system – from large-scale offshore wind to domestic-scale solar panels to increased demand-side participation, using new smart digital systems to manage and control the system in real-time."
