Coal mining
Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, since the 1880s, has been used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United Kingdom and South Africa, a coal mine and its structures are a colliery, a coal mine a pit, the above-ground structures the pit head. In Australia, "colliery" refers to an underground coal mine. In the United States, "colliery" has been used to describe a coal mine operation but nowadays the word is not used. Coal mining has had many developments over the recent years, from the early days of men tunnelling and manually extracting the coal on carts, to large open cut and long wall mines. Mining at this scale requires the use of draglines, conveyors, hydraulic jacks and shearers. Small-scale mining of surface deposits dates back thousands of years. For example, in Roman Britain, the Romans were exploiting most of the major coalfields by the late 2nd century AD.
The Industrial Revolution, which began in Britain in the 18th century and spread to continental Europe and North America, was based on the availability of coal to power steam engines. International trade expanded when coal-fed steam engines were built for the railways and steamships; until the late nineteenth century coal was mined underground using a pick and shovel, children were employed underground in dangerous conditions. Coal-cutting machines were introduced in the 1880s. By 1912, surface mining was conducted with steam shovels designed for coal mining; the most economical method of coal extraction from coal seams depends on the depth and quality of the seams, the geology and environmental factors. Coal mining processes are differentiated by whether they operate on the underground. Many coals extracted from both surface and underground mines require washing in a coal preparation plant. Technical and economic feasibility are evaluated based on the following: regional geological conditions.
Surface mining and deep underground mining are the two basic methods of mining. The choice of mining method depends on depth, density and thickness of the coal seam. Coal that occurs at depths of 180 to 300 ft are deep mined, but in some cases surface mining techniques can be used. For example, some western U. S. coal that occur at depths in excess of 200 ft are mined by the open pit methods, due to thickness of the seam 60–90 feet. Coals occurring below 300 ft are deep mined. However, there are open pit mining operations working on coal seams up to 1,000–1,500 feet below ground level, for instance Tagebau Hambach in Germany; when coal seams are near the surface, it may be economical to extract the coal using open cut mining methods. Open cast coal mining recovers a greater proportion of the coal deposit than underground methods, as more of the coal seams in the strata may be exploited; this equipment can include the following: Draglines which operate by removing the overburden, power shovels, large trucks in which transport overburden and coal, bucket wheel excavators, conveyors.
In this mining method, explosives are first used in order to break through the surface or overburden, of the mining area. The overburden is removed by draglines or by shovel and truck. Once the coal seam is exposed, it is drilled and mined in strips; the coal is loaded onto large trucks or conveyors for transport to either the coal preparation plant or directly to where it will be used. Most open cast mines in the United States extract bituminous coal. In Canada and South Africa, open cast mining is used for both thermal and metallurgical coals. In New South Wales open casting for steam coal and anthracite is practiced. Surface mining accounts for around 80 percent of production in Australia, while in the US it is used for about 67 percent of production. Globally, about 40 percent of coal production involves surface mining. Strip mining exposes coal by removing earth above each coal seam; this earth is removed in long strips. The overburden from the first strip is deposited in an area outside the planned mining area and referred to as out-of-pit dumping.
Overburden from subsequent strips are deposited in the void left from mining the coal and overburden from the previous strip. This is referred to as in-pit dumping, it is necessary to fragment the overburden by use of explosives. This is accomplished by drilling holes into the overburden, filling the holes with explosives, detonating the explosive; the overburden is removed, using large earth-moving equipment, such as draglines and trucks, excavator and trucks, or bucket-wheels and conveyors. This overburden is put into the mined strip; when all the overburden is removed, the underlying coal seam will be exposed. This block of coal may be drilled and blasted or otherwise loaded onto trucks or conveyors for transport to th
Russia
Russia the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country in Eastern Europe and North Asia. At 17,125,200 square kilometres, Russia is by far or by a considerable margin the largest country in the world by area, covering more than one-eighth of the Earth's inhabited land area, the ninth most populous, with about 146.77 million people as of 2019, including Crimea. About 77 % of the population live in the European part of the country. Russia's capital, Moscow, is one of the largest cities in the world and the second largest city in Europe. Extending across the entirety of Northern Asia and much of Eastern Europe, Russia spans eleven time zones and incorporates a wide range of environments and landforms. From northwest to southeast, Russia shares land borders with Norway, Estonia, Latvia and Poland, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, China and North Korea, it shares maritime borders with Japan by the Sea of Okhotsk and the U. S. state of Alaska across the Bering Strait. However, Russia recognises two more countries that border it, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, both of which are internationally recognized as parts of Georgia.
The East Slavs emerged as a recognizable group in Europe between the 3rd and 8th centuries AD. Founded and ruled by a Varangian warrior elite and their descendants, the medieval state of Rus arose in the 9th century. In 988 it adopted Orthodox Christianity from the Byzantine Empire, beginning the synthesis of Byzantine and Slavic cultures that defined Russian culture for the next millennium. Rus' disintegrated into a number of smaller states; the Grand Duchy of Moscow reunified the surrounding Russian principalities and achieved independence from the Golden Horde. By the 18th century, the nation had expanded through conquest and exploration to become the Russian Empire, the third largest empire in history, stretching from Poland on the west to Alaska on the east. Following the Russian Revolution, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic became the largest and leading constituent of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the world's first constitutionally socialist state; the Soviet Union played a decisive role in the Allied victory in World War II, emerged as a recognized superpower and rival to the United States during the Cold War.
The Soviet era saw some of the most significant technological achievements of the 20th century, including the world's first human-made satellite and the launching of the first humans in space. By the end of 1990, the Soviet Union had the world's second largest economy, largest standing military in the world and the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, twelve independent republics emerged from the USSR: Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and the Baltic states regained independence: Estonia, Lithuania, it is governed as a federal semi-presidential republic. Russia's economy ranks as the twelfth largest by nominal GDP and sixth largest by purchasing power parity in 2018. Russia's extensive mineral and energy resources are the largest such reserves in the world, making it one of the leading producers of oil and natural gas globally; the country is one of the five recognized nuclear weapons states and possesses the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction.
Russia is a great power as well as a regional power and has been characterised as a potential superpower. It is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and an active global partner of ASEAN, as well as a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the G20, the Council of Europe, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the World Trade Organization, as well as being the leading member of the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Collective Security Treaty Organization and one of the five members of the Eurasian Economic Union, along with Armenia, Belarus and Kyrgyzstan; the name Russia is derived from Rus', a medieval state populated by the East Slavs. However, this proper name became more prominent in the history, the country was called by its inhabitants "Русская Земля", which can be translated as "Russian Land" or "Land of Rus'". In order to distinguish this state from other states derived from it, it is denoted as Kievan Rus' by modern historiography.
The name Rus itself comes from the early medieval Rus' people, Swedish merchants and warriors who relocated from across the Baltic Sea and founded a state centered on Novgorod that became Kievan Rus. An old Latin version of the name Rus' was Ruthenia applied to the western and southern regions of Rus' that were adjacent to Catholic Europe; the current name of the country, Россия, comes from the Byzantine Greek designation of the Rus', Ρωσσία Rossía—spelled Ρωσία in Modern Greek. The standard way to refer to citizens of Russia is rossiyane in Russian. There are two Russian words which are commonly
Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic
The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic known as the Soviet Ukraine, was one of the constituent republics of the Soviet Union from the Union's inception in 1922 to its breakup in 1991. The republic was governed by the Communist Party of Ukraine as a unitary one-party socialist soviet republic; the Ukrainian SSR was a founding member of the United Nations, although it was represented by the All-Union state in its affairs with countries outside of the Soviet Union. Upon the Soviet Union's dissolution and perestroika, the Ukrainian SSR was transformed into the modern nation-state and renamed itself to Ukraine. Throughout its 72-year history, the republic's borders changed many times, with a significant portion of what is now Western Ukraine being annexed by Soviet forces in 1939 from the Republic of Poland, the addition of Zakarpattia in 1946. From the start, the eastern city of Kharkiv served as the republic's capital. However, in 1934, the seat of government was subsequently moved to the city of Kiev, Ukraine's historic capital.
Kiev remained the capital for the rest of the Ukrainian SSR's existence, remained the capital of independent Ukraine after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Geographically, the Ukrainian SSR was situated in Eastern Europe to the north of the Black Sea, bordered by the Soviet republics of Moldavia and the Russian SFSR; the Ukrainian SSR's border with Czechoslovakia formed the Soviet Union's western-most border point. According to the Soviet Census of 1989 the republic had a population of 51,706,746 inhabitants, which fell after the breakup of the Soviet Union. On January 1, 2018, according to the State Statistics Committee of Ukraine the population of the country was 42,216,766 permanent residents. For most of its existence, it ranked second only to the Russian SFSR in population and political power; the name "Ukraine" is a subject of debate. It is perceived as being derived from the Slavic word "okraina", meaning "border land", it was first used to define part of the territory of Kievan Rus' in the 12th century, at which point Kiev was the capital of Rus'.
The name has been used in a variety of ways since the twelfth century. For example, Zaporozhian Cossacks called their Hetmanate "Ukraine", which can be translated as "Our country" or "our land". Within the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the name carried unofficial status for eastern parts of bigger Kiev Voivodeship and was overshadowed by the more common Little Poland. Since the partition of Poland, the name had disappeared and was replaced with the Russian colonial name of Little Russia; the idea of Ukraine as borderland crept into the English language at some point. Therefore, while Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, Anglophones referred to the Ukrainian SSR as "The Ukraine". However, since the fall of the Soviet Union, the recognized name is "Ukraine"; the definite article may imply that it is a land or general geographic area with unidentified borders. After the abdication of the tsar and the start of the process of destruction of the Russian Empire many people in Ukraine wished to establish a Ukrainian Republic.
During a period of civil war from 1917 to 1923 many factions claiming themselves governments of the newly born republic were formed, each with supporters and opponents. The two most prominent of them were a government in Kharkiv; the Kiev-based UPR was internationally recognized and supported by the Central powers following the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, whereas the Kharkiv-based USR was supported by Soviet Russian forces, while neither the UPR nor the USR were supported by the White Russian forces that remained. The conflict between the two competing governments, known as the Ukrainian–Soviet War, was part of the ongoing Russian Civil War, as well as a struggle for national independence, which ended with the pro-independence Ukrainian People's Republic being annexed into a new Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic, western Ukraine being absorbed into the Second Polish Republic, the newly stable Ukraine becoming a founding member of the Soviet Union; this government of the Soviet Ukrainian Republic was founded on 24–25 December 1917.
In its publications it names itself either the "Republic of Soviets of Workers', Soldiers', Peasants' Deputies" or the "Ukrainian People's Republic of Soviets". The 1917 republic, was only recognised by another non-recognised country, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, with the signing of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty was defeated by mid-1918 and dissolved; the last session of the government took place in the city of Taganrog. In July 1918, the former members of the government formed the Communist Party of Ukraine, the constituent assembly of which took place in Moscow. With the defeat of the Central Powers in World War I, Bolshevik Russia resumed its hostilities towards the Ukrainian People's Republic fighting for Ukrainian independence and organised another Soviet government in Kursk, Russia. On 10 March 1919, according to the 3rd Congress of Soviets in Ukraine the name of the state was changed to the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic. After the ratification of the 1936 Soviet Constitution, the names of all Soviet republics were changed, transposing the second and third ("soviet" or "radianska" in
Soviet Census (1989)
The 1989 Soviet census, conducted between 12-19 January of that year, was the last one that took place in the former USSR. The census found the total population to be 286,730,819 inhabitants. In 1989, the Soviet Union ranked as the third most populous in the world, above the United States, although it was well behind China and India. In 1989, about half of the Soviet Union's total population lived in the Russian SFSR, one-sixth of them in Ukraine. Two-thirds of the population was urban, leaving the rural population with 34.3%. In this way, its gradual increase continued, as shown by the series represented by 47.9%, 56.3% and 62.3% of 1959, 1970 and 1979 respectively. The last two national censuses showed that the country had been experiencing an average annual increase of about 2.5 million people, although it was a slight decrease from a figure of around 3 million per year in the previous intercensal period, 1959-1970. This post-war increase had contributed to the USSR's partial demographic recovery from the significant population loss that the USSR had suffered during the Great Patriotic War, before it, during Stalin's Great Purge of 1936-1938.
The previous postwar censuses, conducted in 1959, 1970 and 1979, had enumerated 208,826,650, 241,720,134, 262,436,227 inhabitants respectively. In 1990, the Soviet Union was more populated than both the United States and Canada together, having some 40 million more inhabitants than the U. S. alone. However, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in late 1991, the combined population of the 15 former Soviet republics stagnated at around 290 million inhabitants for the period 1995-2000; this significant slowdown may in part be due to the remarkable socio-economic changes that followed the disintegration of the USSR, that have tended to reduce more the decreasing birth rates. The next census was planned for 1999. Demographics of the Soviet Union Republics of the Soviet Union Soviet Census First All-Union Census of the Soviet Union Soviet Union Barbara A. Anderson and Brian D. Silver, "Growth and diversity of the population of the Soviet Union", The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 510, No.
1, 155-177, 1990. Ralph S. Clem, Ed. Research Guide to Russian and Soviet Censuses, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986. John C. Dewdney, "Population change in the Soviet Union, 1979-1989," Geography, Vol. 75, Pt. 3, No. 328, July 1990, 273-277. Subjects of Russia, on the www.statoids.com website
Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878)
The Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78 was a conflict between the Ottoman Empire and the Eastern Orthodox coalition led by the Russian Empire and composed of Bulgaria, Romania and Montenegro. Fought in the Balkans and in the Caucasus, it originated in emerging 19th-century Balkan nationalism. Additional factors combined Russian goals of recovering territorial losses endured during the Crimean War, re-establishing itself in the Black Sea and supporting the political movement attempting to free Balkan nations from the Ottoman Empire; the Russian-led coalition won the war. As a result, Russia succeeded in claiming several provinces in the Caucasus, namely Kars and Batum, annexed the Budjak region; the principalities of Romania and Montenegro, each of whom had de facto sovereignty for some time, formally proclaimed independence from the Ottoman Empire. After five centuries of Ottoman domination, the Bulgarian state was re-established as the Principality of Bulgaria, covering the land between the Danube River and the Balkan Mountains, as well as the region of Sofia, which became the new state's capital.
The Congress of Berlin in 1878 allowed Austria-Hungary to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland to take over Cyprus. The initial Treaty of San Stefano, signed on 3 March, is today celebrated as Liberation Day in Bulgaria, although it somewhat fell out of favour during years of Socialist rule. Article 9 of the 1856 Paris Peace Treaty, concluded at the end of the Crimean War, obliged the Ottoman Empire to grant Christians equal rights with Muslims. Before the treaty was signed, the Ottoman government issued an edict, the Edict of Gülhane, which proclaimed the principle of the equality of Muslims and non-Muslims, produced some specific reforms to this end. For example, the jizya tax was abolished and non-Muslims were allowed to join the army. However, some key aspects of dhimmi status were retained, including that the testimony of Christians against Muslims was not accepted in courts, which granted Muslims effective immunity for offenses conducted against Christians.
Although local level relations between communities were good, this practice encouraged exploitation. Abuses were at their worst in regions with a predominantly Christian population, where local authorities openly supported abuse as a means to keep Christians subjugated. In 1858, the Maronite peasants, stirred by the clergy, revolted against their Druze feudal overlords and established a peasant republic. In southern Lebanon, where Maronite peasants worked for Druze overlords, Druze peasants sided with their overlords against the Maronites, transforming the conflict into a civil war. Although both sides suffered, about 10,000 Maronites were massacred at the hands of the Druze. Under the threat of European intervention, Ottoman authorities restored order. French and British intervention followed. Under further European pressure, the Sultan agreed to appoint a Christian governor in Lebanon, whose candidacy was to be submitted by the Sultan and approved by the European powers. On May 27, 1860 a group of Maronites raided a Druze village.
Massacres and reprisal massacres followed, not only in the Lebanon but in Syria. In the end, between 7,000 and 12,000 people of all religions had been killed, over 300 villages, 500 churches, 40 monasteries, 30 schools were destroyed. Christian attacks on Muslims in Beirut stirred the Muslim population of Damascus to attack the Christian minority with between 5,000 and 25,000 of the latter being killed, including the American and Dutch consuls, giving the event an international dimension. Ottoman foreign minister Mehmed Fuad Pasha came to Syria and solved the problems by seeking out and executing the culprits, including the governor and other officials. Order was restored, preparations made to give Lebanon new autonomy to avoid European intervention. In September 1860 France sent a fleet, Britain joined to prevent a unilateral intervention that could help increase French influence in the area at Britain's expense; the Cretan Revolt, which began in 1866, resulted from the failure of the Ottoman Empire to apply reforms for improving the life of the population and the Cretans' desire for enosis — union with Greece.
The insurgents gained control over the whole island, except for five fortified cities where the Muslims took refuge. The Greek press claimed that Muslims had massacred Greeks and the word was spread throughout Europe. Thousands of Greek volunteers were sent to the island; the siege of Moni Arkadiou monastery became well known. In November 1866, about 250 Cretan Greek combatants and around 600 women and children were besieged by about 23,000 Cretan Muslims aided by Ottoman troops, this became known in Europe. After a bloody battle with a large number of casualties on both sides, the Cretan Greeks surrendered when their ammunition ran out but were killed upon surrender. By early 1869, the insurrection was suppressed, but the Porte offered some concessions, introducing island self-rule and increasing Christian rights on the island. Although the Cretan crisis ended better for the Ottomans than any other diplomatic confrontation of the century, the insurrection, the brutality with which it was suppressed, led to greater public attention in Europe to the oppression of Christians in the Ottoman Empire.
Small as the amount of attention is which can be given by the people of England to the affairs of Turkey... enough was tra
Russian Census (2010)
The Russian Census of 2010 is the first census of the Russian Federation population since 2002 and the second after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Preparations for the census began in 2007 and it took place between October 14 and October 25; the census was scheduled for October 2010, before being rescheduled for late 2013, citing financial reasons, although it was speculated that political motives were influential in the decision. However, in late 2009, Prime Minister Putin announced that the Government of Russia allocated 10.5 billion rubles in order to conduct the census as scheduled. Results showed the population to stand at 142.9 million. Since the previous 2002 census, population had decreased by 2.3 million. According to the 2010 census, urban population is 105.3 million, rural population is 37.5 million. The urbanisation rate is 73.7%. The median age is 38 years; the ethnic composition is dominated by Russians. Demographics of Russia Russian Census 2010 final results Results of 2010 All-Russia population census Official website of the 2010 Census
Emancipation reform of 1861
The Emancipation Reform of 1861 in Russia known as the Emancipation Edict of Russia, was the first and most important of liberal reforms passed during the reign of Emperor Alexander II of Russia. The reform abolished serfdom throughout the Russian Empire; the 1861 Emancipation Manifesto proclaimed the emancipation of the serfs on private estates and of the domestic serfs. By this edict more than 23 million people received their liberty. Serfs gained the full rights of free citizens, including rights to marry without having to gain consent, to own property and to own a business; the Manifesto prescribed. Household serfs were the least affected: they gained only their freedom and no land. In Georgia the emancipation took place in 1864, on much better terms for the nobles than in Russia; the serfs were emancipated in 1861, following a speech given by Tsar Alexander II on 30 March 1856. State owned serfs, i.e. the serfs living on Imperial lands, were emancipated in 1866. Prior to 1861 Russia had two main categories of peasants: those living on state lands, under control of the Ministry of State Property those living on the land of private landownerswith only those owned considered to be serfs.
They comprised an estimated 38% of the population. As well as having obligations to the state, they were obliged to the landowner, who had great power over their lives. By the mid-nineteenth century, less than half of Russian peasants were serfs; the rural population lived in households, gathered as villages, run by a mir —isolated, conservative self-sufficient and self-governing units scattered across the land every 10 km or so. Imperial Russia had forty percent of them containing six to ten people. Intensely insular, the mir assembly, the skhod, appointed an elder and a'clerk' to deal with any external issues. Peasants within a mir shared land and resources; the fields were divided among the families as nadel —a complex of strip plots, distributed according to the quality of the soil. The strips were periodically redistributed within the villages to produce level economic conditions; the land however, was not owned by the mir. The peasants were duty-bound to make regular payments in labor and goods.
It has been estimated that landowners took at least one third of income and production by the first half of the nineteenth century. The need for urgent reform was well understood in 19th-century Russia. Much support for it emanated from universities and other intellectual circles. Various projects of emancipation reforms were prepared by Mikhail Speransky, Nikolay Mordvinov, Pavel Kiselyov. However, conservative or reactionary nobility thwarted their efforts. In Western guberniyas serfdom was abolished early in the century. In Congress Poland, serfdom had been abolished. Serfdom was abolished in governorates of Estonia in 1816, in Courland in 1817, in Livonia in 1819. In 1797, Paul I of Russia decreed that corvee labor was limited to 3 days a week, never on Sunday, but this law was not enforced. Beginning in 1801, Alexander I of Russia appointed a committee to study possible emancipation, but its only effect was to prohibit the sale of serfs without their families. Beginning in 1825, Nicholas I of Russia expressed his desire for emancipation on many occasions, improved the lives of serfs on state properties, but did not change the condition of serfs on private estates.
My intention is to abolish serfdom... you can yourself understand that the present order of owning souls cannot remain unchanged. It is better to abolish serfdom from above, than to wait for that time when it starts to abolish itself from below. I ask you to think about the best way to carry this out The liberal politicians who stood behind the 1861 manifesto—Nikolay Milyutin, Alexei Strol'man and Yakov Rostovtsev—also recognized that their country was one of a few remaining feudal states in Europe; the pitiful display by Russian forces in the Crimean War left the government acutely aware of the empire's weaknesses. Eager to grow and develop industrial and therefore military and political strength, they introduced a number of economic reforms, it was optimistically hoped that after the abolition the mir would dissolve into individual peasant land owners and the beginnings of a market economy. Alexander II, unlike his father, was willing to deal with this problem. Moving on from a petition from the Lithuanian provinces, a committee "for ameliorating the condition of the peasants" was founded and the principles of the abolition considered.
The main point at issue was whether the serfs should remain dependent on the landlords, or whether they should be transformed into a class of independent communal proprietors. The land-owners pushed for granting the peasants freedom but not any land; the tsar and his advisers, mindful of 1848 events in Western Europe, were opposed to creating a proletariat and the instability this could bring. But giving the peasants freedom and land seemed to leave the existing land-owners without the large and cheap labour-force they needed to maintain their estates and lifestyles. By 1859 however, a third of their estates and two thirds of their serfs were mortgaged to the state or noble banks; this was why
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