"Coal fires are to be a thing of the past by 2023....................."
Yes - my late coal-miner father would be turning in his urn if he heard this news. His main aim in his later years was to keep going as long as possible in order to carry on claiming his concessionary coal. I used to rib him, telling him that he was chiefly responsible for global warming. Coal, coal, coal, I even went to Coalville Grammar School.
The clean air act (1956) and subsequent legislation cleaned up the smoke and smog in our cities but I was taken back to the smells of my childhood whilst wandering through the hutongs of old Beijing back in January '98. It was -15 degrees, and the locals were burning coal-fired braziers in the streets. Breathe in that smell ........... ah - wonderful ....... well, no, not really!
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Goodbye to coal 
Goodbye to coal 
