Harris / Nabb / Nuttall Coal, Gas and Electricity

Reviews of United Kingdom Statistical Sources
1. Auflage 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4831-5306-3
Verlag: Elsevier Science & Techn.
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 310 Seiten

Coal, Gas and Electricity is a review of statistical data available for three fuel industries in the United Kingdom: coal, gas, and electricity. Topics covered include energy planning, comparability of fuels, published energy statistics, and energy consumption. This volume is comprised of five chapters and begins by explaining the purpose of energy statistics, such as to provide figures for the total production and consumption of energy and to identify the consumption of energy in sectors of the economy. A brief summary of industry activity concerned and its organization is given in order to present a clear background understanding of how data are collected; what is being measured; the stage at which measurements are made; what the reporting units are; the channels through which returns are routed; and where they are processed. The formulation of a national energy research and development strategy in the United Kingdom is then discussed, along with the comparability of fuels and government-published energy statistics. The last chapter presents statistics on energy consumption. This book will be of interest to energy officials, statisticians, economists, and social science researchers.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Harris, D. J.

Nabb, H.

Nuttall, D.

Maunder, W. F.

Leseproben

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

Publisher Summary

This chapter discusses statistical sources for the coal industry; it covers topic areas that include coal output, sales and consumption, manpower, capital, revenue expenditure, costs, safety and research activities within the industry. The coal industry is unusually well documented with statistics, both in volume of information and in length of historical series. Statistics for the coal industry are kept by the industry, and published by Government and other agencies. The coal industry in the United Kingdom has, during its life, displayed many characteristics. The productivity of coal increased after invention of the Anderson Shearer. However, coal began to be in short supply because of excessive demands; major users of coal were encouraged to seek new sources of primary fuel. Left to the market mechanism, the decline of the coal industry might have been even more substantial in the sixties. As with the industry there have been radical changes in the output and standardization of statistics. Most of these have taken place since nationalization in 1947.

This review is concerned with statistical sources for the coal industry; it covers topic areas that include coal output, sales and consumption, manpower, capital, revenue expenditure, and costs, safety and research activities within the industry.

The coal industry is unusually well documented with statistics, both in volume of information and in length of historical series. Section 2 deals with pre-nationalisation statistical sources. Section 3 covers the organisation of the industry since nationalisation. Section 4 surveys the main sources of data in more detail. Researchers wanting a quick guide to sources of statistics for coal should first refer to Section 4.

Statistics for the coal industry are kept by the industry and published by Government and other agencies and these will be reviewed below. It is important to stress that in addition to these, the researcher would be well advised to get in touch directly with the industry and also the Department of Energy. In case of the industry, the Statistics Department is normally helpful. This author would like to acknowledge the guidance given by Mr K. G. Wood and in particular by Mr S. M. Rizvi of the NCB in this respect. My thanks for their help are also extended to Messrs W. N. T. Roberts, W. A. Hawkins, D. Davies and F. W. Hutber of the Department of Energy. I would also like to thank Mr C. I. K. Forster of the NCB’s Central Planning Unit for comments that he made on an earlier draft of this review.

1.1 General Review of the Industry

The coal industry in the United Kingdom has, during its life, displayed many characteristics. During its early history it contributed in a major way to the Industrial Revolution by providing almost all of the energy required. While other fuels were used towards the end of the nineteenth century, gas and electricity were secondary fuels derived from coal. In this period the coal industry’s market control was dominant. With the advent of the 1920’s the demand for coal began to decline with immediate and far reaching results. In particular, profitability declined, there was an increasing lack of willingness of the mine owners to invest, and there was a considerable amount of industry unrest. The Second World War changed the situation once more, with the demand for coal and coal miners increasing. The glut of coal that was available at the beginning of the war was soon to be diminished and thereafter there was a constant fear that the shortage of coal would hamper the war effort.

After the war the industry was nationalised, and this changed its entire structure and outlook. The National Coal Board (NCB) was established in January 1947, becoming the biggest employer in the Western world, and taking over some 900 previously independent mines, with a turnover of around £360 million per annum. These undertakings charged no less than 8000 different prices for coal. As Schumacher [B 24] noted, the newly instituted National Coal Board’s problems were formidable:

“Colliery reconstruction, the building up of qualified staffs, the development of a coherent price structure and of a meaningful wage structure were some of the industry‘s major tasks from day one to the end of the fifties. In every case it was a matter of bringing order out of something not far short of chaos.”

For ten years following nationalisation increased output was the prime concern of the Coal Board. Costs if not forgotten were neglected, while long-term planning and re-organisation were, to some extent, over-shadowed by the need to deal with continuing difficulties. This was also the period when energy requirements were rising at about 4.5 million tons of coal equivalent per annum, and the industry was unable to meet these demands. Consequently, coal remained subject to statutory control until 1958. In this period the NCB produced two plans. The first was in 1949 and called [B 47], the second [B 45] which was published in 1956. This was also the period when the Fleck Committee [B 52] reported on the organisation of the industry whilst the Hartley Committee [B 39] reported on Europe’s growing energy needs. On the production side the main method of obtaining coal had not significantly changed from the seventeenth century. The ‘Longwall’ method was still used in which all the coal in the pit was extracted. This meant that a team of hewers would cut coal together at the coal face, erecting timber supports as they advanced. As the face advanced the space left behind would be filled with waste except for a small number of roadways through the waste. But this relied on the physical strength and ingenuity of a team of hewers and their support staff. Because of this, mechanisation of the coal face was a concern during the whole of the decade and a significant breakthrough was achieved by the invention of the Anderton Shearer. After it was developed it is claimed that it contributed to the rapid rise in productivity, which began in 1958. The reader requiring fuller details of this period is referred to Roberts [B 21].

In spite of these productivity increases coal began to be in short supply because of the excessive demands; major users of coal were encouraged to seek new sources of primary fuel. Thus, the railway and electricity supply industries were encouraged to use oil, and the Government decided to launch a programme for generating electricity by atomic power. The NCB recognised these changes in its published in 1959 [B 57], but the switch to use of other fuels went too far, and instead of just easing the existing problems of the coal industry, a new set of problems was substituted.

In the early 1960’s the demand for the coal began to decline and the industry’s problems became those associated with excess capacity rather than excess demand. Between 1958 and 1965, 259 pits were shut. These had an output of 32J million tons and a labour force of about 159,000 people. In 1964 the NCB still had about 150 grossly unprofitable pits where working expenses exceeded revenue by over 50p per ton and these pits had a labour force of 118,000 and an output of approximately 33 million tons which at that time represented about one-fifth of the Board’s deep mined output and about one-quarter of its employment [B 20].

Left to the market mechanism the decline of the coal industry might have been even more substantial in the sixties. However, the industry was protected to the extent of there being a tax on fuel and heating oil, a preference given to coal in electricity generation, and a ban on overseas coal and Soviet oil at times when they were cheap enough to be marketed in Britain [B 22].

But the steady decline of the industry lasted into the 1970’s and between 1969 and 1973 the number of colliery wage-earners fell from 336,000 to 268,000. In 1973 there was another dramatic turn in the fortunes of the industry, this time not entirely unrelated to the oil crisis. There was no longer a surplus but a shortage of coal; the central question of general concern was to attempt to stop the contraction of the coal industry which had by that time been going on for at least fifteen years. In addition the coal industry in the early 1970’s was involved in two major industrial disputes which further aggravated the shortage of coal. These disputes were in 1972 and 1974 respectively. The effects of coal shortage were particularly dramatically highlighted in 1974. This resulted in electricity cuts and also a three day working week for most firms. Clearly these would need to be taken into account when interpreting data relating to 1974 generally and also specifically for the coal industry. Later the Department of Energy published the findings of an examination of the coal industry and emphasised that in spite of oil discoveries in the North Sea, the coal industry was likely to expand in the future, reversing the decline which had lasted nearly 20 years [B 30] [B 44] [B 48] [B 49]. Geological exploration work has established that the UK has large reserves of coal. The new Selby project illustrates that the NCB has to establish not only the existence of coal, that it can be mined, but that it has to be mined without disturbing the environment to a substantial extent.

The coal industry,...