A week of protests against coal-fired power stations, including the high profile occupation of a plant at Didcot, Oxfordshire, has been hailed as a success by the Camp for Climate Action.
Three protests began on Monday. In Scotland, activists attempted to stop works beginning at Mainshill Wood, where there are ongoing plans for an opencast coal mine.
In Derbyshire, demonstrators chained themselves to machinery at Shipley opencast coal mine, which supplies coal to Ratcliffe-upon-Soar, the UK's second biggest coal-fired power station. Work at the mine was forced to stop for several hours, according to reports.
Ratcliffe-upon-Soar was targeted recently by a coalition of protest groups in the 'The Great Climate Swoop'.
Didcot protest
The most high-profile protest of the week took place in Oxfordshire as a total of 20 people broke into a coal plant owned by German utility company nPower, which plans to build two new coal-fired power stations in Britain.
Attempts to close the power station down failed but they were able to occupy the plant for 3 days.
One of the activists involved, Amy Johnson, said the aim had been to draw attention to nPower's plans to build more coal-fired power plants in the UK.
'Since E-ON shelved their plans to build a new coal plant at Kingsnorth this month, we realised nPower is the new frontline. They haven’t dropped their plans to build the dirtiest new power stations in Britain for thirty years, and they’re constructing new coal plants right across Europe,' she said.
Useful links
Climate Camp for Action
Mainshill Camp Gathering
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