Guidance

Selling coal for domestic use in England

Rules for coal merchants and retailers selling traditional house coal for use in domestic appliances in England.

• From: Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs
• Published: 16 February 2021
• Last updated: 1 May 2023
  Show all updates

  1. 1 May 2023

     Made a number of updates to the guidance - primarily following the fact that it is now illegal to sell traditional house coal for domestic use in England.

  2. 7 July 2022

     Added information on the legal duty for sellers to inform customers that they can only use coal in an exempt appliance in a smoke control area.

  3. 1 May 2022

     Updated the 'Fines' section under 'Enforcement checks' to show that there is now no limit to the amount you can get fined if you sell unauthorised fuel to customers using 'non-exempt appliances'.

  4. 26 March 2021

     Updated information about supplying traditional house coal directly to a consumer.

  5. 16 February 2021

     First published.

Applies to England

It is now illegal to sell traditional house coal in England for use in homes.

Coal suppliers

Coal suppliers and retailers can continue to sell:

• anthracite coal
• semi-anthracite coal
• low volatile steam coal

Enforcement checks

Enforcement officers will check that suppliers and retailers are not selling traditional house coal.

They may check:

• traditional house coal is not being displayed for sale in retail outlets and online
• records at registered coal merchants to confirm that traditional house coal is not being sold
• records of the types of coal sold (for example, traditional house coal, anthracite, lignite)

Fines

Coal merchants and retailers could be fined by local authority enforcement officers if unauthorised coal is sold to domestic household customers.

Depending on how severe the offence is this could be:

• a £300 fixed penalty fine (FPN) issued by the local authority
• a more substantial fine issued by the courts

Challenging a fine

Read guidance on how to challenge or pay a FPN.

Exemptions

Traditional house coal extracted and sold from the Forest of Dean is exempt. It can continue to be sold locally.