The last coal-fired power station in the United Kingdom officially closes down today, book-ending the nearly 150-year history of British coal power.

The plan to decommission Ratcliffe-on-Soar station came after the then-Conservative government announced in 2015 that it intended to shut all UK coal-fired power stations by 2025 to reduce carbon emissions.

The local government began negotiating a plan in 2021 to redevelop the site and announced it in 2023. The station's German owner, Uniper, later confirmed that all four of the station's units would close by the end of September 2024.

The Ratcliffe-on-Soar station made its last energy delivery at the start of the British summer, supplying 500,000 homes for eight hours using 1,650 tonnes of coal.

A Uniper statement to the ABC clarified the station had been "operating as normal" until its closure, despite making no deliveries.

After closing, Ratcliffe-on-Soar is set to be dismantled "by the end of the decade", according to Uniper.

In its place will be a new development — a "carbon-free technology and energy hub", the company says.

The move makes the UK the first of the G7 nations to go entirely without coal-powered electricity, and is a symbolic step towards the country's ambition to decarbonise electricity by 2030 and become carbon neutral by 2050.

Italy plans rid itself of its last coal-fired power stations by next year, with France following suit in 2027, Canada in 2030 and Germany in 2038. 

'End of an era' for British coal

Coal has played a vital part in British economic history since the world's first coal-fired power station was built in central London in 1882.

The design was credited to Thomas Edison, three years after the invention of the electric light bulb.

Nothing remains of that station, but memories of the choking smog it contributed to live on.

Construction of Ratcliffe-on-Soar Power Station began in 1963. The facility began operating in 1967 and it has dominated the East Midlands landscape in the 60 years since — double the expected "lifetime" of a fossil-fuel plant.

Uniper said this extension was due to "our investments in technical advancements and modifications over the years", including the switch "from delivering base load power to more flexible power generation".

"This and work to reduce the station's environmental emissions have enabled it to be the last coal plant standing in the UK," it said in a statement to the ABC.

At the mainline railway station serving the nearby East Midlands Airport, its giant cooling towers rise up seemingly within touching distance of the track and platform.

Historian Hubert J Pragnell once called the plant "a site of interest rather than beauty", noting the "giant" chimney rising 200 metres high and white smoke emerging from its summit.

Other than as a politely obscured eyesore, the plant was known for being the first fitted with flue gas desulphurisation technology – essentially "scrubbing" equipment that removes the dangerous chemical sulphur dioxide from exhaust gasses.

David Reynolds, a 74-year-old retiree who saw the site being built, anticipated its dismantling would feel "strange" for those used to the sight of it.

"It has always been there," he said.

"When I was younger you could go down certain parts and you saw nothing but coal pits."

Ratcliffe-on-Soar had the potential to power more than 2 million homes, but in recent years was only used during high-usage spikes including a 2022 cold snap and 2023 heat wave.

"It's like the end of an era," local resident Becky said.

Her father, who works at the power station, would be out of a job, she said.

"It's their life."

The power station employed 350 remaining employees before its official closure. 

A Uniper statement to the ABC insisted "every effort is being made to support colleagues in finding suitable redeployment opportunities" elsewhere in the company.

The local council also says the new development will create thousands of jobs.

In a 2023 statement after announcing Ratcliffe-on-Soar's closure, then-leader of the council Neil Clarke estimated 7,000 people could be employed at the new site.

Power plant closure 'only the first step' for energy transition

The UK's energy transition has been brewing for decades, with a sharp decline in coal usage seen between the 1980s and today.

In the 1980s, upwards of 70 per cent of the UK's electricity generation came from coal.

But that portion declined in the 1990s, slumping to 38 per cent in 2013, 5 per cent in 2018, then just 1 per cent last year.

By last year, natural gas represented a third of the UK's electricity production, while a quarter came from wind power and 13 per cent from nuclear power, according to electricity operator National Grid ESO.

Jess Ralston, head of energy at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit think-tank, explained that the UK phased out coal "through a combination of economics and then regulations".

"So larger power plants like coal plants had regulations put on them because of all the sulphur dioxide, nitrous oxides, all the emissions coming from the plant and that meant that it was no longer economically attractive to invest in those sorts of plants," she said.

The new Labour government launched its flagship green energy plan after its election win in July, with the creation of a publicly owned body to invest in offshore wind, tidal power and nuclear power.

Ms Ralston said the UK's 2030 clean-energy target was "very ambitious".

"It sends a very strong message that the UK is taking climate change as a matter of great importance and also that this is only the first step," she added.

When could Australia go without coal?

Both major parties in Australia have outlined plans to phase out coal in the energy transition, with the Australian Energy Market Operator reporting half our coal-fired power stations have announced retirement dates for before 2035, and all but one are set to retire by 2051.

But the operator's 2024 report predicts they will shut down even sooner, with the entire fleet likely to be decommissioned by 2040.

The report says the National Electricity Market "must triple its capacity" by 2050 to replace retiring coal-fired power stations and meet increasing demand.

It calls for "higher levels of flexible gas capacity" alongside "very high penetrations of renewable energy".

Renewables delivered almost 40 per cent of the National Electricity Market's total energy in 2023.

On October 24 , 2023, 72.1 per cent of total National Electricity Market generation came from renewable sources — a new record for a 30-minute period.

But the operator warns "challenges and risks are already being experienced" during Australia's energy transition, including "unplanned coal generator outages", project delays and workforce shortages.

"The possibility that replacement generation is not available when coal power stations retire is real and growing, and a risk that must be avoided," it has said.

ABC/AFP