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Coals to Newcastle?...

Selling snow to the Eskimos; Taking sand to the Arabs; Carrying coals to Newcastle: Spot the odd one out.

Published in 1662, Thomas Fuller’s ‘The History of the Worthies of England’ explained:

“To carry Coals to Newcastle is to busy one’s self in a needless imployment.”

First recorded in the 16th Century, the phrase applied for 450 years. But, in the space of just two generations, it’s been turned on its head…

Mining - and shipbuilding - were once the lifeblood of the region. The Tyne and Wear are still the arteries, but the chief export through the Port of Tyne is now cars, and the number one import? Coal. The UK’s original idiom for pointlessness has become, ironically, pointless.

So what will be the new phrase for the next generation? You’d think with the cost of fossil fuels increasing, their amount running low, and the damage they do to the environment, renewable energy is the way forward? Well, Tyneside and Wearside have a couple of heavyweight contenders:

In the Black & White corner is Shepherd OffShore, run by the former Newcastle United chairman Freddy Shepherd, with plans for a changing environment:

“Instead of ‘Coals to Newcastle’, we want ‘Wind-power to Newcastle’; we want to be known as the wind-power capital of the UK.”

Representing Wearside is Nissan, producing batteries to power a new generation of electric cars. Opening the new £200m plant in 2009, then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown said:

“Just as you led the way in the transport and industrial revolutions, so you are now leading the way in the low-carbon revolution of the future.”

Making batteries for the all-electric Nissan has created 350 jobs. Wearside is turning over a new Leaf.

On Tyneside, Freddy Shepherd was at NUFC when they brought Cole (Andy) to Newcastle.

A generation on, Shepherd OffShore have created a £50m renewable energy park with an Energy College. £50m. You could spend that on a Premiership striker. But football signings were for short-term results - Freddy’s playing the long game now:

“You have to consider the environment… We’re always going to have wind. In ten years we’ll have created a UK umbilical that all the wind-farms can plug in to. So when it’s not windy in Devon, it’ll be performing in the north east and you can alter it - because you can’t store electricity: You produce it, and you use it, or you lose it.”

It reminds me of physics lessons at school. Maybe Einstein applies to the Tyne:

“Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed from one form to another.”

So what about that new phrase?

Bringing Batteries to the Wear? Taking Turbines to the Tyne?

As I thank Freddy Shepherd for the interview, he offers a final thought:

“The Tyne is famous for work and for workmen - put crudely, metal-bashing - and wind-turbines have everything we require.”

Perhaps that’s it. It’s not about the product, but the people. The environment has changed, but the energy remains.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Joseph Payne .