Consultant: Central Appalachian coal outlook poor

Alan Stagg, one of the most respected consultants in the coal industry, told a major industry gathering last month that Central Appalachian coal mining would last at least 10 to 20 more years, but will continue to decline because the job-hungry region's coal is getting more difficult to mine, mainly because of geological limitations but also because of regulations.

"It's going to run out some day — there's a finite amount of coal — but I don't see that happening in 10 or 20 years," Stagg told Pam Kasey of The State Journal, a business-oriented weekly in West Virginia. Stagg, the president and CEO of Stagg Resource Consultants Inc., has been pessimstic about the industry's long-term prospects for several years, as we reported here, but this is his gloomiest forecast yet.

"This is the elephant in the room. No one wants to acknowledge that reserve depletion is profound," Stagg, of Cross Lanes, W.Va., said at Platt's Coal Marketing Days in Pittsburgh on Sept. 21, according to SNL Financial. "Mining conditions are difficult, and the cost to produce is high. That is a physical fact. It's not pleasant. Nobody wants to acknowledge it. That is a fact, and companies that ignore that fact will not do so well. . . . And by nature, regulations will always increase."

"Stagg cast such a pall on the Central Appalachia coal industry that West Virginia Coal Association President Bill Raney, speaking later in the day, said he felt like a 'funeral director'," Darren Epps wrote for SNL. "Stagg expressed optimism, however, for the Powder River Basin" in Wyoming, which overtook West Virginia as the leading coal-producing state many years ago.


An earlier version of this story was based on a report from SNL Financial that Stagg says misquoted him as saying that he expects coal mining in Central Appalachia to end in the next 10 to 20 years. He did not dispute the rest of the report.

'Cost of Coal' explores life cycle of the rock and its effects on human health in W.Va., Mich. and Nev.

The Sierra Club has partnered with award-winning photojournalist Ami Vitale to produce a photographic essay for its magazine about the life cycle of coal and its effects on the lives of residents living close to mine sites, power plants and coal-waste disposal areas, most of which are in rural areas.

"Cost of Coal" includes an 18-page photo spread in the November/December issue of Sierra, and an interactive website with more than 100 photos and videos of individuals living near four sites impacted by coal: Blair, W.Va., Lindytown, W.Va., River Rouge, Mich., and near the Moapa Band of Paiutes Reservation in Moapa, Nev. Slide shows and videos are organized by location and story on the website, where readers can donate to the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal campaign, Living Green Magazine reports.

Here's a video overview of the project:

Good pay, independent culture, dislike of Obama make Appalachian coal miners 'proud to be scabs'

"As recently as the 1980s, plenty of coalfield residents thought Big Coal was the problem. But these days, in . . . Central Appalachia — southern West Virginia, southwestern Virginia, eastern Kentucky and eastern Tennessee — coal mining is overwhelmingly popular, despite well-documented risks to workers’ health and community safety," reports Gabriel Schwartzman of In These Times, a liberal, labor-oriented managzine. (Photo by Schwartzman: Supervisory miner gets coffee before work)

Schwartzman spent this summer in the region trying to determine why the previous Democratic and union stronghold has turned so sharply to the right, and doesn't mince words in presenting his conclusion: "At $108,000 a year, nothing in Appalachia compares to miners' wages," he writes. Those wage increases are linked to increased mechanization and smaller workforces, and have changed the political and financial nature of that workforce, he reports. One miner in Pike County, Kentucky, told him he would lose everything if "coal was shut down" because no job in the region could pay him as much.

The union battles for higher wages, better safety and benefits of 30 years ago were largely lost, ultimately ending with the United Mine Workers of America abandoning strikes, Schwartzman writes. Companies raised wages without unions, but cut many jobs with increased mechanization. A major unionized company in the region, Patriot Coal, is now bankrupt and unable to pay miners' pensions.

Miners with jobs told Schwartzman the non-union life is good. "We are scabs. We're proud to be scabs," one surface miner at Camp Branch mine in West Virginia told him. They are loyal to their companies, and that loyalty extends to families, friends and businesses supported by coal miners, Schwartzman reports. But an Energy Information Administration forecast of a 58 percent decline in Central Appalachian coal production by 2035 is reason for many to worry. Though the current decline is being caused mainly by competition from cheap natural gas and the decreased viability of Appalachian coal, miners tend to believe increased environmental regulation is the cause.

Schwartzman reports intimidation and threats received by those who advocate for safer mining practices or oppose mountaintop-removal mining. "Social media is used as a mobilizing tool against 'tree huggers,'" Schwartzman reports. "Aside from calling rallies and protests, post like this August 6 one appear regularly on Citizens for Coal's Facebook page: 'Just saw a post saying tree hugger in Gilbert eating at Wallys restaurant.'"

Many miners expressed to Schwartzman the need to vote out President Obama, even though his administration increased mine safety inspections, probably reducing miner injuries; increased health care for black-lung victims, and increased investments in clean-coal technology. Schwartzman writes that coal companies stir up anti-Obama rhetoric, but the Christian right and the National Rifle Association also play a role. "Those forces play upon values of autonomy and independence that run deep here," Schwartzman writes. "For 150 years, these values have helped Appalachians survive outsiders exploiting their mountain resources. Now those values have become aligned with out-of-state coal companies against environmentalists and liberals." (Read more)

Neither party has supported policies that will help the coal miner, Betty Dotson-Lewis writes for the Daily Yonder.

Physicians for Social Responsibility say 'each step of the coal life cycle impacts human health'

A new report released this week analyzes the human health impacts of coal, with a specific focus on the cumulative impacts of air pollution from burning coal on the respiratory, cardiovascular and nervous systems. The Physicians for Social Responsibility study, "Coal's Assault on Human Health," concluded that "each step of the coal life cycle -- mining, transportation, washing, combustion and disposing of post-combustion waste -- impacts human health."

Researchers found that mining of coal contributes to heart disease, cancer, stroke and chronic respiratory diseases, four of the five leading causes of death in the U.S. In particular, burning coal contributes to diseases affecting large portions of the U.S., including asthma, lung cancer, heart disease and stroke. It also impairs lung development, increases heart-attack risk and hinders intellectual development. The report adds to previous correlation studies suggesting possible links between mountaintop mining and increased rates of disease in Appalachia by University of West Virginia public-health professor Michael Hendryx.

Physicians for Social Responsibility makes several recommendations, including reducing carbon dioxide emissions "as deeply and as swiftly as possible," ending construction of new coal-fired power plants, reduction of fossil fuel use and the development of renewable energy sources. (Read more)

Judge rejects bid to preserve site of coalfield battle

West Virginia's Blair Mountain, the site of the largest armed conflict in U.S. labor history, will remain off the National Register of Historic Places, a federal judge has ruled. The site was added to the list in 2009, but the Interior Department removed it after it was found that a majority of property owners didn't support the listing, Paul Nyden of The Charleston Gazette reports.

Coal companies may mine the area, and a lawsuit was filed in 2010 by several groups, including the Sierra Club, Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition and Friends of Blair Mountain, seeking to restore the area to the register. Judge Reggie Walton of the District of Columbia ruled that the groups had no legal standing because no coal companies had announced "immediate plans to begin mining on Blair Mountain," Nyden reports. (Read more)

Ken Ward Jr. of the Gazette's Coal Tattoo puts it this way: "The judge ruled that the citizen groups could not meet one of the requirements to show 'standing' to bring the case, that of 'redressability,' or that a favorable ruling from the court would redress their injury." As a result, the judge said in his decision "that the surface mining would be permitted on the Blair Mountain Battlefield as a result of permits that were acquired prior to the historic district's inclusion on the National Register."

In 1921, more than 10,000 union miners fought with armed company employees and contractors along the ridge along the Logan-Boone County border for a number of things, including better working conditions. The battle lasted eight days, and only ended after federal troops and air support intervened.

Coal company to pay $575,000 to resolve claim it falsified water quality reports

A large strip-mining company has agreed to pay $575,000 in a case that involved thousands of alleged instances of fraudulent or improper water-pollution discharge reports in Kentucky. Bill Estep of the Lexington Herald-Leader reports that International Coal Group has reached an agreement in principle with the state and environmental groups to settle claims against it, according to a status report on the lawsuit the state Energy and Environmental Cabinet filed this week in Franklin Circuit Court.

The deal with ICG, if approved in court, writes Estep, "would end its part of a controversy that came to light in the fall of 2010. That was when environmental groups announced they had discovered widespread problems with water-pollution discharge monitoring reports from ICG and Frasure Creek" Mining, a second party to the suit that is not part of the proposed settlement.

"Coal companies must monitor pollutants coming from surface mines and report the data to the state, which is supposed to investigate if pollutants exceed certain levels," Estep explains. "The groups said in reviewing reports from ICG and Frasure Creek from 2007 and 2008 they found cases of mineral discharges exceeding legal limits by up to 40 times. There also were forms signed by supervisors before tests were actually done, data copied and pasted from one quarter to the next, and testing dates scratched out and rewritten. Some reports were missing. The groups argued the reports were falsified and that Kentucky was not doing a good job reviewing them for violations. A Kentucky official later acknowledged the state had not done enough to make sure mining companies were submitting accurate information."

Larry Gibson, who helped start the fight against mountaintop-removal mining of coal, dies at 66

Larry Gibson, who spent most of the last 25 years fighting large-scale strip mining in Central Appalachia, died yesterday after suffering a heart attack while working on his land atop Kayford Mountain in Raleigh County, West Virginia. He was 66.

In 1986, Gibson moved back to his birthplace and childhood home on Kayford Mountain and found that coal companies had started mountaintop-removal mining on his family's land, threatening his family cemetery, which was "the final resting place for his ancestors stretching back to the 18th century," reports Mackenzie Mays of The Charleston Gazette. Gibson told the Gazette's Ken Ward Jr. in 1997 that the graveyard and a nearby community park that he built was "the last 54 acres the coal companies don't own. They own all the rest. I don't think the coal companies have the right to take everything."

Gibson was among the first Appalachian people to protest publicly against mountaintop mining and faced backlash from his community as a result, according to his daughter, Victoria, 24. He was shot at, run off the road by coal trucks and burned in effigy by those who disagreed with him, she told Ashley Craig of the Charleston Daily Mail. But he never stopped fighting to save his home and the homes of other from mountaintop removal.

"When my dad passed away you could still smell the mountain air on him," she said. "You could still see the dirt underneath his nails and the stains on his hands. He was working. He lived his life devoted to the mountain."

Gibson once said, "My mother gave me birth, but this land gave me life. Growing up here was an adventure every day. I played with my pet bobcat, my fox, my hawk. All of these things, the good Lord provided on this land, But just a stone's throw away, on that mountaintop-removal mining site, you couldn't find anything alive if you wanted to. It's bare rock, uninhabitable."

He refused to sell his land for mining, and instead put 50 acres on top of Kayford Mountain into a land trust, which means it is protected and can never be sold. He built cabins there, and the area has been the site of the annual Mountain Keeper Music Festival for the last 26 years. Gibson was founder and president of the Keeper of the Mountains Foundation, and was director of the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition. He traveled the world speaking with families, communities, churches and university groups against mountaintop removal.

The Keeper of the Mountains Foundation released a statement about Gibson's passing, and Ward eulogizes him on his Coal Tattoo blog, here.

Who wins in W.Va. when big surface coal mine comes (too?) close to adventure tourism sites?

One-wheel cycling, one of the many
adventures in the New River Gorge.
(Photo by Harrison Shull)

Perched on the rim of the New River Gorge and a short drive from the Gauley River, a major whitewater stream, Fayetteville, W.Va., is one of the country's top outdoor destinations. But before its reincarnation as an adventure mecca, Fayetteville suffered the boom and bust of both timber and coal. Jesse Wood of Sierra Magazine writes that rafters, canoeists, kayakers and cliff climbers have "transformed the local economy and revitalized the area."

Now Frasure Creek Mining is proposing a major expansion of its mountaintop-removal coal operation in the center of Fayette County. Those who make their living in sustainable tourism fear the worst, Wood reports. After all, it seems like a hard-luck deja vu to many of them. When major underground mines shut down, said Clif Bobinski, "tourism seemed like the new way to try to make it and stay. Now a lot of restaurants are dependent on that business." The influx of outdoor enthusiasts has influenced Fayetteville's culture in other ways as well. Before the tourism boom, many downtown storefronts stood vacant; now they house a yoga studio, a bead shop, art galleries, multi-ethnic cafes, and numerous biking, climbing, and whitewater shops. The national Boy Scout Jamboree is expected there in 2019.

(Map from Plateau Action Network shows Fayetteville and New River Gorge bridge on US 19 at lower right, and new mine area at far lower left; click on map for larger image)
Some worry now whether the crowds will continue to flock to an area scarred by an enormous strip mine. The project would cover 3,662 acres and create 20 "valley fills" for the mountaintops leveled to reach the coal. Blasting can already be heard within the gorge, sometimes several times a day; the strip mine is visible from high spots; and Fayetteville's outdoor community isn't trusting the coal industry to "do it right," Wood reports. Kenny Parker, co-owner of an outdoor-gear shop co-owner, "emphasizes that he's not against coal miners," saying: "Everybody's father and everybody's grandfather was a coal miner. You respect that because that is their heritage. I understand that. But like it or not, coal is not going to rule the day in Fayette County." (Read more) For Catherine Moore's story in The Register-Herald of Beckley about approval of the permit, click here.

In southern W.Va., 5% of land has been mountaintop mined, but 22% of streams show harm from mining

About 5 percent of southern West Virginia has been excavated by mountaintop-removal coal mining, but 22 percent of the region's streams show significant harm to aquatic life, according to a study by Duke University researchers. The study could have implications in other areas with high rates of surface mining. (NASA satellite image: mine in Boone County)

Researchers say large amounts of minerals leach into streams from valley fills that have been filled with rock blasted from the mountaintops and ridges above. Sara Peach of Chemical and Engineering News reports that researchers have previously documented water pollution near individual mines, but have not been able to detect how far the pollution traveled, study author Emily Bernhardt said. Her study found harm to aquatic life in more than 1,700 miles of streams in southern West Virginia.

Bernhardt and her co-authors mapped chemical and biological data from 223 streams sampled by the state Department of Environmental Protection between 1997 and 2007, and found that salinity and mineral levels in the region's streams increased with the total area of mountaintop mines. They also discovered that as the number of mines increased, fewer sensitive insect species were found downstream. Substantial declines in insect populations were seen with just 1 percent of upstream land mined. In areas where 5 percent of upstream land has been mined, so many species have disappeared that the streams would qualify as biologically impaired, a designation that would place the streams on a list of waterways that states have to rehabilitate. (Read more)

Federal agency finds elevated levels of problematic substances in air, soil and water near strip mines

After a year of testing air, water and soil around mountaintop removal mine sites in Central Appalachia, the U.S. Geological Survey has found high levels of toxins in the soil and water, concluding that people in southern West Virginia living close to these sites are living in an environment "with significant chemical discrepancies from the rest of the state," reports Alice Su of The Center for Public Integrity. The findings are the first conclusive scientific evidence by a federal agency that mountaintop removal mining could cause human health risks.

USGS research geochemist Bill Orem, the principal investigator, said water in mining areas had unusually high acid and electrical conductivity levels in the water, air had abnormal levels of particulates, and soil and streams had irregular levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. "Several PAH compounds are probable or possible human carcinogens," Su notes. Orem said results are preliminary and research is still being conducted, but soil samples from mining areas were "certainly different" from those in non-mining areas, and that airborne silica particles, known to cause lung disease, were "definitely higher."

Orem said the USGS will be "prudent" to connect preliminary data to actual health problems in the region that have been documented in controversial correlation studies by West Virginia University public health professor Michael Hendryx. "You have to be conservative in your statements," Orem said. "It can't be driven by people's feelings. It has to be a scientific, data-driven process." (Read more)

More Appalachian coal than ever being exported

U.S. coal exports have doubled since 2009, reaching 107 million tons last year, and three out of every four tons exported come from mountaintop-removal mines in Appalachia, according to Democrats in the U.S. House.

The Charleston Gazette's Ken Ward Jr. says coal exports "make up a small share of coal production" in Appalachia, but the report by House Natural Resources Committee staff members did find that 97 surface mines in the region exported overseas in 2011 compared to 73 in 2008, exports in the region have grown by 91 percent since 2009, and those 97 mines exported 27 percent of their overall production in 2011. To read the report, click here.

Author says coal industry in southern W. Va. is 'Godzilla . . . thrashing around before death'

 Denise Giardina

A West Virginia author who wrote a fictional retelling of West Virginia's mine wars believes that "coal is dying," reports Lori Kersey of The Charleston Gazette. "It's clear it's dying," Denise Giardina said Sunday. "Probably not in my lifetime, but it's dying. And Southern West Virginia is dying. And it's not going to come back. Those mountains are not going to come back." Giardina's comments came during the final installment of the 2012 Little Lecture Series by the West Virginia Humanities Council.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of Giardina's award-winning novel, Storming Heaven, which tells the story of life in the state's southern coalfield and the events leading up to and culminating with the Battle of Blair Mountain, between unionists and coal forces backed by federal troops and air support.

Her novel and a sequel, The Unquiet Earth, were fictional, she said, but based on truth. Their point, said the author, was simple: "The coal company giveth and the coal company taketh away." In her lecture Sunday, Giardina described the coal industry today "as Godzilla suffering a wound and thrashing around before death. . . .What do we have left?" she asked. "We have a community that's ravished by drugs, where there are no jobs."

Arch Coal to lay off 650 Appalachian miners, mostly in E.Ky.; blame game begins

Blaming market conditions and regulatory obstacles, Arch Coal announced its intent to lay off about 650 miners -- 500 of those in Eastern Kentucky, 125 in West Virginia and 25 in Virgina. “You’ve got people that are going to lose their homes, lose their livelihood,” Perry County Judge-Executive Denny Ray Noble of Hazard, Ky., said of the decision, terming it "a disaster" for the region.

"Some Kentucky officials directly blamed the layoffs on recent actions by the Obama administration and the federal Environmental Protection Agency, which have taken a more aggressive stance in recent years to reduce emissions from coal-fired power plants and to crack down on water pollution from surface mining," Mike Wynn of The Courier-Journal reports. But Matt Wasson of the environmental group Appalachian Voices challenged those assertions, saying while Kentucky mining operations have laid off more than 900 workers in recent months, coal companies have attributed nearly all of those cuts to market conditions. “It’s really unfortunate that is how some of the local officials are going to play this,” he said. “That is all about politics. . . . The reality is that four years ago coal supplied half of our electricity. Today it supplies a third. That has enormous consequences."

Rockefeller tells West Virginia to stop listening to 'scare tactics' of coal industry

Jay Rockefeller, the five-term Democratic senator from the nation's most coal-dependent state, told West Virginians today that they need to stop listening to the fear-mongering and scare tactics from the coal industry and told them it's time they woke up to the truth. He told them he is worried for their future and for their health.

The occasion for his passionate remarks was his refusal to go along with a coal industry-backed resolution of disapproval of the Environmental Protection Agency’s rules on mercury and air toxins, which failed to pass on Wednesday, 53 to 46.

Rockefeller said the industry's "scare tactics are a cynical waste of time, money, and, worst of all, coal miners’ hopes. But sadly, these coal operators have closed themselves off from any other opposing voices and few dared to speak out for change – even though it’s been staring them in the face for years."

The senator added that he wants West Virginians to prepare for the future in light of coal's finite quantity, the rise of natural gas, and the increasing desire for a low-carbon economy. He asked that they consider the health implications of the rule in question and remarked, "I oppose this resolution because I care so much about West Virginians." For his text, from The Charleston Gazette, go here.

A bit of background on the rule: On December 21, 2011, EPA announced the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, the first national standards on power-plant emissions of mercury and toxic air pollution such as arsenic, acid gas, nickel, selenium, and cyanide. The standards will slash emissions of these dangerous pollutants by relying on widely available, proven pollution controls that are already in use at more than half of the nation’s coal-fired power plants.  For more on the MACT rules, click here.

EPA sues coal companies, says they buried Eastern Kentucky streams without proper permits

The Environmental Protection Agency has accused several Eastern Kentucky coal mining companies of burying streams in the region without proper permits, Bill Estep of the Lexington Herald-Leader reported earlier this month. The agency said in a lawsuit that the companies should restore the sites or pay for mitigation projects elsewhere. The suit was filed in federal court in Pikeville, in the heart of the Central Appalachian coalfield.

The damages sought by EPA could reach into the millions of dollars. Companies named in the lawsuit are Frasure Creek Mining, Essar Minerals, Trinity Coal Groups, Trinity Coal Partners, Bear Fork Resources, Falcon Resources and Prater Branch Resources. EPA alleges that beginning in 2005, the companies buried more than 11,000 feet of streams at two surface mines in Eastern Kentucky without the required federal permits. (Read more)

CDC says 4% of Central Appalachian surface miners tested have black-lung disease

Nearly 4 percent of surface coal miners who work in Central Appalachia who were tested for a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have black lung disease, compared to 2 percent of all U.S. surface miners and 3.2 percent of underground coal miners. (Getty Images photo)

Though the study didn't test Kentucky separately from the 14 other states assessed, Laura Ungar of The Courier-Journal in Louisville asked about it and found that "13 of 230 Kentucky surface miners tested — or 5.7 percent — had black lung," she reports, quoting Cara Halldin, a CDC epidemic intelligence service officer, as calling that number " a disproportionate burden."

It's not clear why the incidence is higher in Central Appalachia than other parts of the country, but Halldin suspects it has to do with "more years spent mining, area geology or the safety culture at mines," Ungar reports. One study showed miners who work in Central Appalachia typically work 28 years in the mines while non-Appalachian miners work average 20 years.

Black-lung disease, or coal workers' pneumoconiosis, is the result of miners repeatedly inhaling the dust that comes from extracting coal. That dust occurs whether the miner is under- or above-ground. "Coal mining is really, really dusty. Don't matter what you do, you're in the dust," said John Bud Ritchie, a retired surface miner who has black lung disease. "It's real rough. You can't hardly keep the dust down on hot days."

The federal exposure limit for "respirable dust" in underground and surface mines is 2 milligrams of coal dust per cubic meter of air. That limit was set in 1969, along with a law that set up "a surveillance system for assessing prevalence of black lung among underground coal miners," Ungar reports. "But the requirement for surveillance doesn't extend to surface miners." Haldin said, "Industry should recognize this is a problem and their workers are at risk and bring down the levels." (Read more)

In the wake of the CDC study, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health is offering free black-lung screenings in Eastern Kentucky, Hazard, Ky.'s WYMT-TV reports. The screenings will be at various locations in Eastern Kentucky throughout the summer and will be confidential. They will include a work history questionnaire, chest X-ray and a spirometry test, with the whole process lasting about 25 minutes. NIOSH will provide participants with results of their screenings, and will not release information to the public or give it to coal companies. For a list of when and where the screenings will take place, click here.