I've been playing around with a fantastic website called CoalintheUK.org, which lists all the existing and pending coal mines and coal-fired power stations in the UK.
It was interesting to learn, from the site, that if every proposed coal mine in the UK goes ahead it will triple the country's coal output. Equally fascinating to see the areas into which these coal mines fall - the seams of coal which lie beneath the soil in parts of Scotland, Wales and England are plain to see.
Most useful of all are the regular updates on coal mines and coal-fired stations around the country; the operators of the site who work for the small Public Interest Research Centre, put in Freedom of Information requests every week to get the information on the site, and also rely on a more informal network around the country.
If they can keep the site going at this level (it was first launched about nine months ago, and keeps growing and growing) it will certainly become a crucial stopping point for information about coal campaigns in the UK.
You might assume that the government is collecting all this information - but astonishingly it isn't.
