It is the world’s oldest and most famous lawn tennis tournament, so it is no surprise that Wimbledon pulls out all the stops to keep its grass immaculate.
But achieving a garden as vivid green as the courts of the All England Club is not as impossible as one may believe, as its secret ingredient – a rare mineral salt mined beneath the Yorkshire Moors – can be bought for just £10.
Polyhalite is a naturally occurring crystal made up of four nutrients – potassium, calcium, magnesium and sulphate – which experts say can help to make grass and other crops grow faster and stay healthy when used alongside other fertilisers.
That’s from that mine where the civil servants said they’d not give planning permission because there was no market for the output.
In April 2011, the mine began the world’s first commercial production of polyhalite, a rare mineral that has been found in large quantities in a seam out to sea from the mine, with total resources estimated at over a billion tonnes lying more than 0.93 miles (1.5 km) offshore. The mineral has a commercial potential as an inorganic fertiliser.[11]
In April 2014, Cleveland Potash was awarded a £4.9 million government grant to support the mining
Does it actually count as being beneath the N.York Moors I wonder if it’s under the sea.
Trivia alert – the grass is cut to a height of 0.3149606 inch (Well OK, the bloke on Al Beeb / ‘Paedo’s R Us’ said 8mm, but this is England so he can fuck off).
Bongo
I suspect Tim’s referring to the Woodsmith, not the Boulby Mine.
Pedantry: Boulby mine, aka Cleveland Potash Mine, owned by ICL, isn’t the same operation as Woodsmith mine – the one under the North York moors, which was owned by Sirius Minerals until taken over by Anglo American.
A family friend was in management at Boulby. Went for a tour myself as a prospective new young engineer, but then the credit crunch hit, they started laying people off and I made other plans. This was back in 2008. They were planning the polyhalite extraction back then (it was a product they hadn’t mined before).
I asked my friend about Woodsmith mine in 2012, and he wasn’t impressed (good call because Sirius Minerals crashed to virtually nothing). They were planning to pump the product to the surface as a wet slurry, then transport it to North Africa (!) for drying out. I see from the Wiki page that they’re now bringing it to the surface dry.
Another story: when we had the cold winter in 2009/10 they had a phone call from Gordon Brown, asking if they could supply any rock salt. When I was there the previous year there were huge mountains of the stuff. They were making a loss of £5-£10 for every tonne brought to the surface, but couldn’t avoid this because tunnels through rock salt (as opposed to the potash layer) were more stable. But when G Brown called it was too late as by then it had all been sold to the Americans.
@Silverite – I believe you meant “Pendantry”.
This being Timmy’s gaff ‘n all.
https://www.timworstall.com/category/pendantry/
Lol, I thought that’s what I said. Must have been autocorrected
Is the price £10 a tonne, a pound, or for the whole lot?
@ Kevin S
Presumably £10 for enough polyhalite to make your garden lawn resemble Wimbledon as per the headline. The only current (pre-Woodsmith) commercial producer charges “between $100 and $200” per ton. The Woodsmith project will reduce the price.
A bit more Gobble Worming and they’ll need to bring back scythes…