Zeitz-Weißenfelser brown coal area

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The Zeitz-Weißenfels lignite district is part of the Central German mining region . It lies between Zeitz and Weißenfels in the south-east of Saxony-Anhalt .

Demarcation

The Zeitz-Weißenfelser brown coal area is reliefed by the river meadows of the Saale and White Elster . It is predominantly already assigned to the loess hill country with a slope and deeper river valleys. The area forms the southwestern edge of the Weißelster basin and is limited in:

Until the middle of the 20th century, the slightly larger northern part of the district belonged to the Weißenfels district and the southern part to the Zeitz district . Both districts belonged to the Prussian province of Saxony and from 1947 to the newly founded state of Saxony-Anhalt . From 1950 several district reforms took place in the GDR : The area was now in the Halle district , mostly in the newly founded Hohenmölsen district and in the Zeitz district and peripherally in the Weißenfels district . By the year 1946 Weissenfels Zeitz coal mining area that was for the Mining Authority Zeitz charge that after the authorities Designation Technical Mining Survey Zeitz received. In 1960 it was renamed the Zeitz Mining Authority , which was subordinate to the newly formed Supreme Mining Authority of the GDR in Leipzig . The seat of the Zeitz mining authority was moved to Borna in 1961 and existed until 1990.

In the course of German reunification and the restoration of the state of Saxony-Anhalt and after several district area reforms , the area is now completely in the Burgenland district . To the east it borders directly on the Meuselwitz-Altenburger lignite mining district and to the northeast directly on the Borna mining district . In the north, the Zeitz-Weißenfels lignite district joins the Hallesches Revier and the Geiseltal . The operational supervision of lignite extraction and lignite refurbishment mining is now the responsibility of the State Office for Geology and Mining , based in Halle (Saale), without an intermediate instance .

history

The bitumen-rich lignite in the Zeitz-Weißenfels area was formed in the Eocene around 40 to 56 million years ago. It is interpreted as the marginal facies of a lignite bog with primarily resin-rich flora, or as a relic of a dry forest with strongly decomposed plant matter, or as a subsequent enrichment of the bitumen through later decomposition of the humus substances in the coal under the thin overburden . The deposit was shaped by a twelve to 20 meter thick and relatively uniform main seam . The overburden ceiling was often only a few meters. Disturbed by the effects of the Ice Age , the brown coal deposits came to light in some places . That is why surface lignite mining probably began long before the year 1000.

The first documented evidence of the mining and use of lignite in the Zeitz-Weißenfels area dates back to the 15th century. In 1485 the diocese of Merseburg granted the privilege of "mining in the coal mountain" near Holleben and delimited individual areas in it. The existence of the Zeitz Mining Authority has been documented since 1743, with written documents about the territorial boundaries and rules of lignite mining in the Zeitz-Weißenfels area dating back to 1546. In the middle of the 16th century, Georgius Agricola (* 1494; † 1555) summarized the entire mineralogical and geological knowledge of the time in his main work De re metallica after numerous trips through central German and Bohemian mining areas . Agricola is considered to be the founder of modern geology and mining . His grave is in Zeitz Cathedral .

From 1743 the Zeitz-Weißenfelser lignite mining area was in the area of ​​validity of the Saxon mining regulations . At that time, large parts of the region had already been cleared . In order to obtain fuel for heating and cooking, the farmers in the area began with the first major excavations of the "brown stones". This mostly happened where the raw material was just below the surface, for example in the river valleys of the Rippach , Nessa or Grunau. These small so-called peasant mines produced little coal and were mostly abandoned after a short time. Experienced miners were rare, and simple technical aids such as a pick, shovel and hand reel were used .

The commercial use of brown coal began with its use as fuel in salt pans . For a targeted promotion, however, an investigation of the deposits and possible methods of mining the coal was first necessary. The Saxon Elector Friedrich August III. Therefore, in 1791, Abraham Gottlob commissioned Werner to search for, measure and map the coal deposits in the province, but also to clarify property issues and develop concepts for mining and dewatering. Werner used several students from the Freiberg Mining Academy to take stock , among them Georg Philipp Friedrich von Hardenberg, known as Novalis .

In some places in the Zeitz-Weißenfels brown coal area, such as Granschütz , Webau , Teuchern, Grana and Aue near Zeitz, the electoral geologists discovered pyropissite deposits , a particularly bitumen-rich coal with a tar content of 30 to 70 percent . The main report on the Saxon coal deposits published in 1811 is still used today for the purpose of comparison. The mining law of the Electorate of Saxony was in effect until 1918 and said that the owner of a parcel of land automatically owned the rights of use for the mineral resources below. In the rest of Prussia , to which the Province of Saxony belonged from 1815, the natural resources were owned by the state.

19th century

The right of use under the Electoral Saxony was very helpful to entrepreneurs like Carl Adolph Riebeck , who recognized the value of coal, which was rich in tar, and acquired large areas of land in the region at the beginning of the 19th century. Initially, mining was carried out in civil engineering using tunnels that were driven into the seam on valley slopes, such as at Runthal, Köpsen and Wählitz . As a result of a process of concentration, starting in 1850, many small mining pits merged into financially strong joint stock companies . In the Zeitz-Weißenfeld lignite district, these included:

With the financial strength of these companies, the construction of smelting plants , the mechanical wet stone production and the establishment of briquette factories became possible. During this time the first industrial processing plants for lignite went into operation, such as the Anna-Antonie Schwelerei bei Deuben (1857–1931) or the Berlin-Wildschützer paraffin and mineral oil factory (1857–1884). Due to the high bitumen content of the coal containing it, numerous refiners for the extraction of paraffins , mineral oils , tar and tar products were established. The Zeitz-Weißenfels lignite district thus became the “cradle of German carbochemistry ” and a pyrolysis center .

Paraffin production began in 1854 at the Saxon-Thuringian AG in Gerstewitz . Shortly afterwards, A. Riebeck'sche Montanwerke AG in Webau and Werschen-Weißenfelser Braunkohlen AG in Köpsen set up large factories for converting lignite into tar and paraffin . In addition to paraffin candles, the first asphalt was made from lignite tar in the Zeitz-Weißenfels area from 1855 . The lignite from the Zeitz-Weißenfelser district also developed as a basis for lubricating oils, lamp oils , gas or green coke . From 1865 onwards, tar and candle production throughout Germany was mainly based on lignite paraffin. In Webau alone, 32 candle drawing machines were pulling 20,000 kilograms of paraffin candles a month.

At the same time, the number of sugar factories rose rapidly in the region, making the province of Saxony the “sugar province”. The enormous fuel requirements of these factories, but also of brickworks, distilleries and other businesses, had a major influence on the development of the lignite industry. The first steam engine was installed in the mining area by Carl Adolph Riebeck in 1865 in his pit 397 in Reußen near Theißen . Due to the high demand, a mechanical engineering sector for excavators, lorries , conveyor systems and special vehicles for the mining industry was created in the Zeitz-Weißenfels area . From the 1870s, Zeitzer Eisengießerei und Maschinenbau AG (ZEMAG) developed into the leading supplier of equipment for briquette factories throughout Germany , in particular coal mills , coal dryers and briquette presses .

In 1884 the Weißenfels-Zeitzer Mining Association was founded , which represented the employers' interests of eleven mining companies located in the area with a total of 41 lignite mines, seven briquette factories, 26 wet presses, 24 smelting plants and seven mineral oil factories. In 1889 the Herrmannschacht briquette factory was founded, which worked until 1959 and is still preserved today as an industrial monument. It is also considered to be the oldest, preserved briquette factory in the world.

20th century

From 1900 onwards, price agreements and an excessive pursuit of profit led to a nationwide supply crisis , the so-called coal shortage . Against this background, the mining entrepreneurs from the Zeitz-Weißenfels brown coal district joined the Central German Brown Coal Syndicate as early as 1909 . However, the cartel proved to be unstable, so that between 1910 and 1913 there was an increasing number of company consolidations. As a result, at the beginning of the First World War, only two large companies were still active in the Zeitz-Weißenfelser district: Riebeck'schen Montanwerke AG and Werschen-Weißenfelser Braunkohlen AG.

After the First World War, there was a huge increase in production capacity in all German lignite regions. Germany had to cede numerous areas under the Versailles Treaty and lost around 40% of its best hard coal deposits . The coal mining areas that were left in place also had to pay considerable reparations . This made lignite an indispensable energy factor in all branches of industry. While before 1919 the share of lignite in electricity generation due to its low calorific value, its poor transportability and the lack of heating and transmission technology, the coal shortage associated with the assignment of territories and the self-sufficiency efforts in the Weimar Republic forced an increase a share of almost 60% of energy generation.

Against this background, took place in 1925 in Groitzschen the disruption of the first mine in Zeitz-Weissenfels coal mining area by the Werschen-Weißenfelser lignite AG. On October 1, 1930, Gaumnitz became the property of Werschen-Weißenfelser Braunkohlen AG and in 1932 it was the first place in the Zeitz-Weißenfelser district to give way to lignite. The Riebeck'schen Montanwerke opened up the Carl Bosch opencast mine (called "Kamerad" after 1945) near Göthewitz from 1934, and from 1937 the Otto-Scharf mine (called "Einheit" after 1945) near Köttichau, and in 1940 the Pirkau opencast mine near Döbris . Werschen-Weißenfelser Braunkohlen AG, which merged with the Anhalt coal works in 1940 , was still operating the opening of the Wählitz II opencast mine northeast of Wählitz from 1938 and the opening of the Profen opencast mine from 1940 .

As a result of the merger, the paraffin works in Webau and Köpsen developed into the largest candle producer in Germany. From then on, the large open-cast mines supplied the company's own smelting plants and briquette factories with raw coal. For the time, the Otto-Scharf mine of the Riebeck'schen Montanwerke was a superlative opencast mine. Among other things, a bucket chain swing excavator with a cutting height of 55 meters was used - in 1938 the largest excavator in the world. A works railway ran out of the pit directly to the processing facilities in Deuben, which were newly built at the same time . The tractors specially developed for the Otto-Scharf-Grube were among the world's heaviest and most powerful electric locomotives for several years . At the same time, in 1937, Braunkohle-BENZ AG (BRABAG) began building the hydrogenation plant in Tröglitz . The plants went into operation in March 1939 and produced synthetic fuels and lubricating oils from lignite tar. The millions of tons of lignite required for this were mainly supplied by A. Riebeck'sche Montanwerke AG and Anhaltische Kohlenwerke, which at the same time participated in the founding capital of BRABAG.

The Second World War caused only minor damage to the lignite works in the Zeitz-Weißenfels mining area. After the war, the companies were expropriated and transferred to Soviet joint-stock companies (SAG). Quite a few pits and factories lost up to 100 percent of their machinery through dismantling . In the following years the factories mainly produced for the USSR . As of April 1952, the permitted SMAD the GDR the stages have "buy-back" of lignite plants. However, only after the popular uprising of June 17, 1953, the reparations payments were completely stopped.

In the period that followed, lignite mining reached a completely new dimension. The GDR almost exclusively used domestic brown coal to generate energy. The maximization of the production volumes led to the use of huge areas. Places that were in the coal fields were consistently dredged. Centuries-old manors, churches and cultural monuments were destroyed, cemeteries desecrated, entire forests cleared, rivers and streams relocated, canalized or diked. The mining of lignite took place in the GDR with practically no consideration for people or environmental concerns. The self-sufficiency efforts in the GDR changed the landscape in the Zeitz-Weißenfels area permanently. From 1947 onwards, over 20 places and districts were devastated in the region , for which more than 6000 people had to leave their homes. With the exception of Profen , all of the opencast mines were already exhausted in the early 1970s. In the following decades, the areas left behind resembled a huge lunar landscape.

present

After German reunification in 1990, most of the processing plants in the Zeitz-Weißenfels mining area were no longer economically competitive. The majority of the industrial plants were shut down and demolished. The intensively operated mining left behind numerous contaminated sites - open opencast mining holes , filled with groundwater and often with unstable embankments , abandoned industrial plants with partly heavily contaminated soil and groundwater. In the transition to the 21st century, the restoration and recultivation of the post-mining landscapes began .

Since 2007, within the framework of the EU funding program LEADER, there has been a joint initiative called Zeitz-Weißenfelser Braunkohlerevier , which expanded its territory in 2014 and renamed it the Saxony-Anhalt South Mining Region . Among other things, a “coal cycle path” runs through the district over a total length of 19 kilometers. It begins in Zeitz at the Herrmannschacht briquette factory , leads past the site of the former Groitzschen Schwelerei near Kretzschau and the ruins of the Paul II mine behind Theißen , turns off to the Deuben mining museum and ends at Mondsee , a recultivated open-cast mine south of Hohenmölsen . There is also a large section of the Mitteldeutsche Strasse der Braunohle in the Zeitz-Weißenfels lignite district.

Unchanged is the open pit Profen in operation, according to the approved by the state government of Saxony-Anhalt basic operating plan intended with its mining fields and Schwerzau Domsen run until the year 2035 is approached. Today, coal is mainly used to generate electricity . In addition to the Wählitz industrial power plant, the Deuben industrial power plant, the oldest active lignite power plant in Germany, is also operated in the Zeitz-Weißenfels lignite district .

See also

Web links

Commons : Lignite mining in Saxony-Anhalt  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Wolfram Pflug: Lignite mining and recultivation. Springer-Verlag, 2013, p. 772.
  2. ^ Location Zeitz-Weißenfelser brown coal area Bergbau-Museum Deuben, accessed on September 8, 2019.
  3. ↑ Zeitz Mining Authority, Saxony-Anhalt State Archive, accessed on September 8, 2019.
  4. ^ Kurt Pietzsch : The brown coal of Germany. Borntraeger brothers, 1925, p. 288.
  5. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels, p. 13. LMBV, accessed on September 10, 2019.
  6. ^ Otfried Wagenbreth : History of Geology in Germany. Springer-Verlag, 2014, p. 209.
  7. ^ Richard Hunger : Biostratonomy and palaeobotany of the carboniferous deposits of the Eocene humodile of the Zeitz-Weißenfelser district. Dissertation, Halle, 1939. In: Braunkohlenarchiv. 51/1939, pp. 33-69.
  8. ↑ Bergamt Kamsdorf Landesarchiv Sachsen-Anhalt , accessed on September 16, 2019.
  9. ↑ Georg Agricola Society (ed.): From Georgius Agricola to Central German lignite mining. Aspects of the mining history. Georg Agricola Society, Zeitz, 2006, p. 79.
  10. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels, p. 13. LMBV, accessed on September 10, 2019.
  11. ↑ Dirk Hackenholz: The electrochemical works in Bitterfeld, 1914-1945. A location of IG-Farbenindustrie AG. LIT Verlag Münster, 2004, p. 46.
  12. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels, p. 13. LMBV, accessed on September 10, 2019.
  13. ↑ Dirk Hackenholz: The electrochemical works in Bitterfeld, 1914-1945. A location of IG-Farbenindustrie AG. LIT Verlag Münster, 2004, p. 46.
  14. ↑ Klaus-Peter Meinicke, Klaus Krug, Uwe Gert Müller: Industrial and environmental history of the Saxony-Anhalt region. Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, 2003, p. 23 ff.
  15. ↑ Mitteldeutsches Braunkohlenrevier, Wandlungen und Perspektiven, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels, p. 13. LMBV, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  16. ↑ DEBRIV (Ed.): 50 years of Central German lignite mining. Festschrift for the 50th anniversary of the German Braunkohlen-Industrie-Verein e. V. Halle (Saale), 1885–1935. Published by Wilhelm Knapp, Halle (Saale), 1935.
  17. ↑ The "Herrmannschacht" briquette factory. Association "Central German Environment and Technology Park" e. V., accessed on September 10, 2012 .
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  19. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels (p. 6.) LMBV, accessed on April 25, 2019
  20. ↑ Ursula Bischoff: The influence of mining traditions and large-scale industrial developments on the social structure and mobility of the lignite workers in Borna. Dissertation, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 2000, p. 76. Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  21. ↑ Gaumnitz Museum-Digital, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  22. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels (p. 20.) LMBV, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  23. ^ Chronicle of the history of chemistry at the Webau site, Deutsches Chemie-Museum Merseburg, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  24. ^ Ernst Voigt: Geographical local history of Zeitz and its surroundings. Sis-Verlag, 1925, p. 107.
  25. ↑ W. Hertz (Ed.): Journal for the mining, metallurgy and saltworks in the Prussian state, Volume 86. W. Hertz, 1938, p. 238.
  26. ^ Otto-Scharf-Grube, Riebeck'sche Montanwerke AG, Halle (1939–1952) . werkbahn.de, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  27. ↑ Franz Spausta: fuels for internal combustion engines. Springer-Verlag, 2013, p. 72.
  28. ↑ Central German brown coal district, changes and perspectives, issue 19, Profen, p. 6 f. LMBV, accessed on September 21, 2019.
  29. ^ Christiane Künzel: Administration of Soviet [state] stock corporations in Germany (SAG). In: Horst Möller, Alexandr O. Tschubarjan (Ed.): SMAD-Handbuch. The Soviet military administration in Germany 1945–1949. Oldenbourg-Verlag, 2009, pp. 388-395.
  30. ^ Resettlements: Political and economic framework conditions in the GDR archive of lost places, accessed on March 7, 2019.
  31. ^ Rolf Dieter Stoll, Christian Niemann-Delius, Carsten Drebenstedt, Klaus Müllensiefen: The lignite opencast mining: Significance, planning, operation, technology, environment. Springer, 2008, p. 442 f.
  32. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels LMBV, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  33. ↑ Central German Brown Coal District, Changes and Perspectives, Issue 18, Zeitz / Weißenfels LMBV, accessed on September 20, 2019.
  34. ^ History of the Montanregion Sachsen-Anhalt Süd LEADER - Local Action Group Montanregion Sachsen-Anhalt-Süd, accessed on September 17, 2019.
  35. ↑ RECARBO-Kohleradweg Saale-Unstrut-Tourismus eV, accessed on September 8, 2019.
  36. ↑ Lignite phase-out Deutschlandfunk, broadcast on January 31, 2019, accessed on September 21, 2019.
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  38. ↑ The history of the Deuben power plant . Greenpeace factsheet, accessed on September 21, 2019.