No coal

Union Jack flag

Britain’s reliance on coal-fired power set to end after 140 years

Home to the world’s first coal-fired power station, opened in London in 1882, the U.K. is set to be the first G7 country to stop using coal to generate electricity, one year earlier than first set out by the previous Conservative government in 2015. In the coming weeks, it will officially close the lone remaining coal-fired plant in the country, a station known as Ratcliffe, near the city of Nottingham.

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Coal

Coal’s share of power capacity in India drops below 50% for first time since 1960s

India is rapidly emerging as a renewable energy powerhouse on the world stage with a surge in both capacity addition and tendering to add more plants, according to new research. Renewable energy accounted for 71.5% of the record 13,669 MW power generation capacity added by India in the first quarter of 2024, while coal’s share of total power capacity dropped below 50% for the first time since the 1960s.

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Coal pollution

G7 agree to close all coal-fired generating stations by 2035

Energy ministers from the G7 countries — Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union — agreed at a meeting in Turin, Italy, to close all coal-fired generating stations in their countries by 2035 if not sooner. Putting an end date on coal — the most polluting of all fossil fuels — has been highly controversial at international climate talks. Until this point, Japan, which derived 32% of its electricity from coal in 2023 according to the climate advocate Ember, has blocked progress on the issue at past G7 meetings.

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Texas flag

Solar generates more power than coal in Texas for first time ever

Solar generation in Texas was 3.26 terawatt hours (TWh) in the month of March, beating the 2.96 TWh sent out by coal-fired generators. It’s the first time solar has beaten coal over a whole month in Texas, the largest user of coal for power generation of any state in the U.S. The share of coal generation in Texas is now declining rapidly, from 40% more than a decade ago and 30% in 2017 to 13.9% in 2023.

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Power plant polluting

Germany shuts down seven brown coal power stations at end of winter

Seven coal-fired power stations in Germany were shut down over Easter as the need for the power declined, power generators RWE and LEAG say. Five had been taken out of the reserve by the German government to cope with a shortfall in gas supplies through the winter, and a further two had been allowed to continue operating after their scheduled shutdown date, the companies said.

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Facility production thick air pollution

Slovakia plans to be coal-free by 2024, six years earlier than originally planned

Slovakia stopped production at its last coal-fired power plant this week. Its electricity will now come almost entirely from nuclear and renewable sources. Slovakia originally slated its coal phaseout for 2030 but has now expedited this to mid-2024, when it will join Belgium, Austria, Sweden and Portugal as Europe’s coal-free countries.

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Small German town with polluting coal plant in the distance

E.U. approves German state aid for early closure of coal plants

The European Commission has agreed that Germany should be allowed to pay the energy giant RWE some €2.6 billion in state aid for the early closure of coal power stations. Under German law, no more electricity is to be produced from coal from 2038 onward. However, this new agreement moves the date forward to 2030.

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