It appears many green campaigners and local councillors are not familiar with the process of steel manufacture.

Having worked at Workington Iron & Steel Company at Moss Bay works, I feel that I am qualified to explain how steel is manufactured.

Presently, there is no viable commercial process to allow steel to be manufactured without using coke or charcoal as a fuel source. Currently, about 70 per cent all new steel globally is produced using iron oxide, coking coal and limestone. Coking coal is usually coal with special qualities that are needed in the blast furnace. The other 30 per cent of steel is made from recycled steel in electric arc furnaces which consume huge amounts of electricity.

By allowing construction of a new coal mine at Whitehaven, it will reduce the transportation emissions of coal being shipped to Britain from far-flung countries such as Australia, Brazil, Canada and Russia. Why create these emissions by transporting coal thousands of miles, whilst we have coal on our doorsteps?

Perhaps, at some future date the ‘Hydromor’ process which proposes to replace coke with hydrogen as the fuel source to make steel, can become economic, but the timeframe for this technology is decades. Producing hydrogen consumes energy to liquefy the gas to make it useable. Hydrogen needs to be compressed which uses energy to reduce the temperature to minus 273.87C.

Therefore, by allowing construction of coal mine at Whitehaven, this will provide much-needed employment for the people of west Cumbria, which is fast becoming an economic desert unless other forms of well-paid employment are forthcoming.

What is the difference between burning coal mined and Whitehaven and burning coal that has to be transported from Australia to be burned to make coke? Burning coal from Whitehaven will provide jobs for West Cumbria. Coal from Australia will provide jobs for Australians. Cumbrian councillors are first and foremost for Cumbrians not for Australians

All very well to talk green, but actions, not words, bring about change. So why not crowdfund Hydromor technology, instead of funding overpaid lawyers, attorneys and barristers to oppose a decision which has already been taken to proceed by a democratically elected body of councillors?

David Kirkwood

Greenbank Close

Prospect

Aspatria