Poland must close its last coal mines before 2049
Audio 02:37
"Welcome to hell" can be read on a wall in the city of Bytom, in Silesia, which suffered the full brunt of the consequences of the mine closures in the 1990s. © RFI - Sarah Bakaloglou
By: Sarah Bakaloglou Follow
4 min
In Poland, coal mines, numbering 13, must close by 2049. The decision of the Polish government was taken under pressure from the European Union, following the carbon neutrality deadline set at 2050, without the support from Warsaw, however.
Closing the mines is a major challenge: the coal industry employs some 80,000 miners, and provides more than 70% of Poland's electricity.
Our correspondent went to Silesia, the mining region in the southwest of the country, where we are miners from father to son.
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