LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's coal production fell by 51 percent to a record low last year as all large deep mines closed and others neared the end of their operational life, preliminary government statistics showed on Thursday.
Coal output fell to just over 2 million tonnes of oil equivalent last year, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) said in 2016 provisional energy data.
Britain's coal production has fallen by 77 percent in the last five years.
Coal accounted for 10.6 percent of electricity supplied in 2016, down from 25.8 percent in 2015, due to coal plant closures and a carbon price floor which has made coal-fired generation more expensive than gas-fired power.
More detailed estimates of 2016 will be published on March 30, BEIS said.