Shallow cuts : the geological sectioning of Newcastle, NSW

Coal is formed by ancient plant matter, left on the forest floor that accumulates (sometimes through flood or fire) and is then compressed by subsequent layers of sediment, causing transformations in its physical and chemical composition. This compression causes these organic layers to crystallise into seams and, as the pressure and temperature is increased over time, they become enriched in carbon. In between can be thousands of years of relative geological stability.2 These thin black seams form narrow, undulating layers in the shallow crust of the earth, marking its history and traumas. They occasionally emerge in the present in mountains or cliffs where the geology reveals itself as narrow layers of compressed time. While these coal seams represent, relatively, one of the most recent geological layers of the planet, they have played a far-reaching role in its spatial and economic development. With the advent of industrialisation, coal became a key resource for emerging Imperial powers in Europe, who were anxious to fuel the rapid expansion of machines against a backdrop of dwindling timber resources. The extraction of coal also began to shape a different infrastructure above the ground. From the 18th century, the source of fuel to power machines shifted from living organic matter growing out of the earth to hardened, crystallised inert matter, compressed beneath it.