CLIMATE activists held a demonstration in Kendal last week - making a stand against the West Cumbria’s Mining project.

The project aims to extract nearly three million tonnes of coal per year near Whitehaven, Cumbria and the plan is for this to happen until 2074.

The demonstration was held at New Road Common, Kendal on Thursday and saw members from Extinction Rebellion South Lakes, Ambleside for the Future and South Lakes Action on Climate Change all take part.

Maggie Mason, a retired member the county council’s minerals planning team, said “Councillors need to be very clear that these negative effects are highly significant and must be added to the impacts on West Cumbria’s tourist economy, and it’s reliance on the much-loved West Coast and coast-to-coast walking routes that would be redirected into an underpass, past trains being continuously loaded with coal.

"The only real positives are the wages from jobs at the mine, because 87 per cent of the coal was always planned to be exported, and it could be more, yet planning policies say that unless the national and local economic effects of the proposed mine clearly outweigh the significant impacts, applications for coal extraction should be refused.”

Last’s weeks march follows on from a series of actions taken by climate activists against the mining project, including a demonstration in Kendal and the hanging of banners from bridges reading ‘No Future in Coal!’

Thursday’s display was to coincide with a key meeting that would approve the mine, but the discussions were postponed.

Climate activist and group member Henry Goodwin was part the demonstration.

He said: “Contrary to West Cumbria Mining’s case, the coal from this mine is not needed to maintain the UK or European Steel industry.

"New evidence from the Materials Processing Institute, submitted to the council, shows conclusively that European steel making is changing rapidly to use lower carbon alternatives that don’t need coal, initially Electric Arc Furnaces using scrap steel, and by 2026, commercially produced steel using hydrogen instead of coal. Demand for coking coal is set to reduce significantly by 2030 and will not persist for the 50-year life of the mine. The county council has also received evidence from Professor Paul Ekins, who said that opening the mine would increase global carbon emissions."ed”.