The UK's first new coal mine in three decades has been blocked by the High Court.

Planning permission to build a new coal mine in Cumbria has been quashed following a High Court ruling that the approval was unlawful. Unless the developer withdraws its application, the government will now have to reconsider whether to allow the mine to be built.

In a ruling, the Court also indicated that all UK fossil fuel extraction projects can be challenged on grounds of the end use of materials rather than the direct emission of processing, laying the groundwork for wider internation legal implications.

The judgment follows legal challenges by Friends of the Earth and South Lakes Action on Climate Change (SLACC) to a December 2022 decision to grant planning permission.

In making its judgment, the High Court agreed with Friends of the Earth and SLACC that the climate-changing emissions from burning the extracted coal, 99 per cent of the emissions from the mine, were not properly considered during the planning process. It dismissed the arguments to the contrary made by the developer, West Cumbria Mining (WCM), which persisted in defending the court case even though the Government had pulled its defence.

In addition, Mr Justice Holgate agreed with Friends of the Earth that the Secretary of State acted unlawfully in accepting WCM’s claim that the mine would be ‘net-zero’ and have no impact on the country’s ability to meet the emissions cuts required under the Climate Change Act 2008 (CCA). The mining company had claimed it would ‘offset’ the emissions from its mine through purchasing carbon credits from abroad. However, Government policy does not allow reliance on international offsets to meet carbon budgets under the CCA.


The Judge also agreed with both claimants that the Secretary of State’s approach to substitution was legally flawed. WCM had argued that Whitehaven coal would simply ‘substitute’ for coal that would otherwise be extracted elsewhere in the world, so there would be no net increase in global carbon emissions. That assertion was strongly opposed by both Friends of the Earth and SLACC. The Judge concluded that it was “impossible to reconcile the inconsistencies and muddle” in the Secretary of State’s reasoning on this issue.
The ruling means that Communities Secretary Angela Rayner will now have to reconsider the planning application taking into account its full climate impact.

---