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world news Diamars 26 OctOber 2021

Plan for UK coal mine brings hope to some, horror to others

(AP) — In the patchwork while opening a new coal
of hills, lakes and sea that The proposed deep mine mine might look bad at first
make up England’s north- symbolizes a dilemma fac- glance, the Cumbria County
west corner, most people ing the British government: project aims to be different
see beauty. Dave Crad- It aims to generate all of the be design.
duck sees broken dreams. U.K.’s electricity from clean
energy sources by 2035 and “Showing these mines can
The coal mine where the to reach net-zero carbon be made by law…to capture
74-year-old once worked has emissions by 2050. But Con- greenhouse gas emissions
long closed. The chemical servative Prime Minister Bo- and required to offset any
factory that employed thou- ris Johnson has also pledged residual impact…is true en-
sands is gone. The nuclear to boost prosperity in Eng- vironmental leadership,” he
power plant is being decom- land’s neglected north with said.
missioned. new factories, roads, railways
and other infrastructure that Environmentalists scoff at
To Cradduck, a plan for a new environmentalists say is at that idea.
coal mine that could bring odds with the government’s for new nuclear plants mov- kie, says it will be “transfor-
hundreds of jobs is a sign that green agenda. “It’s blindingly obvious that ing at a crawl, the U.K. gov- mational.”
“at least someone’s interested the quickest way to stop these ernment is still considering
in the area” and an opportu- West Cumbria Mining, the carbon emissions and to make new fossil-fuel projects. The British government, un-
nity “for people who have got company hoping to build radical changes — which we der pressure from opponents
mining in their blood.” Britain’s first deep coal mine have to do in the next 10 years In the North Atlantic, west and its own environmental
in three decades, wants to — is to stop opening any new of the Shetland islands, Shell commitments, intervened in
But environmentalists view extract coking coal — a type coal mines,” said Maggie Ma- and Siccar Point Energy plan March and ordered an in-
the proposed mine with hor- used to make steel rather son, a local opponent of the to extract 170 million barrels quiry by a planning inspec-
ror. They say it sends a disas- than for fuel — from under mine. “The same is true for of oil from the Cambo oil- tor. The inspector says he
trous message as the United the Irish Sea. It plans to pro- oil wells and gas wells.” field. Environmental groups will make a recommendation
Kingdom welcomes world cess the coal on the site of a are trying to force the British around the end of the year.
leaders, advocates, diplomats shuttered chemical plant in Nature and industry have government to stop the drill- Then the U.K. government
and scientists to Glasgow, Whitehaven, 340 miles (550 long vied for supremacy in ing. Johnson’s administration will make a final decision —
Scotland, for a United Na- kilometers) northwest of this part of England. White- is reluctant to intervene, say- well after COP26 has ended.
tions Climate Change Con- London. haven sits on the edge of the ing “sources like Cambo are
ference that starts Oct. 31. Lake District National Park, still required” to meet Brit- Local supporters of the mine
The company describes the an area whose beauty in- ain’s energy needs as it shifts believe they are the silent
Many scientists and activ- project as a new kind of mine, spired William Wordsworth to a low-carbon economy. majority, at risk of being
ists consider the two-week far removed from the dirty, and Beatrix Potter. The area drowned out by environ-
COP26 conference a last dangerous behemoths whose also once was home to indus- “We need to transition our mental activists. Some ral-
chance to nail down carbon- brick and steel skeletons dot tries that offered hard, dirty existing oil and gas sector to lied at the site this month,
cutting promises that could the region’s landscape. West jobs in factories and mines. a decarbonized platform,” holding signs that read “Part
keep global warming within Cumbria Mining says it will Business Secretary Kwasi of the answer, not part of
manageable limits. be the world’s first net-zero These days, wind turbines Kwarteng said last month in the problem” and “Cumbria
coal mine, with all of its car- spin beside the sea — a sign of the House of Commons, ac- coke is the real thing.”
“The U.K. sets itself out as a bon emissions reduced or Britain’s transition from fos- cusing Cambo opponents of
leader, but it’s building a coal offset by credits to the Gold sil fuels to renewable energy, wanting “a complete eclipse” “It’s been very simplified in
mine, which is the most pol- Standard Foundation, an en- which last year produced al- of the oil and gas industries the press that it’s jobs against
luting thing that you can do,” vironmental organization. most half of the country’s “with 250,000 jobs vanishing the climate,” said John Grea-
Rebecca Willis, a professor Plans show curved modern electricity. That share shrank overnight.” sley, who helps run a Face-
of energy and climate gover- buildings that blend in with this year, however, partly due book page in support of the
nance at Lancaster Univer- the surrounding hills. to a lack of wind. In West Cumbria, the local mine. “And, of course, the
sity, said. “It sends a signal to authority approved the mine climate is going to win ev-
the rest of the world that the Alexander Greaves, a lawyer With the cost of imported a year ago. The area’s Con- ery time. But it’s deeper than
U.K. isn’t actually serious.” for the mining company, said natural gas soaring and plans servative mayor, Mike Star- that.”

German court sentences IS woman to 10 years in prison

(AP) — A German convert day on charges that, as a Iraq, she allowed a 5-year- husband chained the young
to Islam was sentenced to member of the extrem- old Yazidi girl she and her Yazidi girl in a courtyard and German media reported that
10 years in prison Mon- ist Islamic State group in husband kept as a slave to left her to die of thirst. she made her way to Iraq
die of thirst in the hot sun. through Turkey and Syria in
The child was “defenseless 2014 to join the IS. In 2015,
The Higher Regional Court and helplessly exposed to as a member of the extrem-
in Munich convicted the the situation,” judge Joachim ist group’s “morality police,”
30-year-old, identified only Baier said on Monday, adding she patrolled parks in Fallu-
as Jennifer W. in line with that W. “had to reckon from jah and Mosul, armed with
privacy rules, of — among the beginning that the child, an assault rifle and a pistol as
other things — membership who was tied up in the heat well as an explosive vest and
of a terrorist organization of the sun, was in danger of looking for women who did
abroad, aiding and abetting dying”. not conform with its strict
attempted murder, attempt- codes of behavior and dress,
ed war crimes and crimes However, she had done prosecutors said.
against humanity, German nothing to help the girl — al-
news agency dpa reported. though this had been “pos- She was taken into custody
sible and reasonable” for her, while trying to renew her
Federal prosecutors had ac- Baier said, according to dpa. identity papers at the Ger-
cused the woman, from Loh- man embassy in Ankara in
ne in Lower Saxony, of stand- W. grew up as a Protestant but 2016, and deported back to
ing by in Iraq as her then- converted to Islam in 2013. Germany.