Where coal is king - like it or not

kw: musings, mining, coal

Mining and farming are major industries in South Dakota, where we lived for eight years. During our time there, a nationwide political push got underway to add restrictions to mining, particularly coal mining, and to reduce agricultural subsidies. The farmers and miners both protested, and a popular slogan was seen on bumper stickers and tee shirts: "Let 'em starve in the dark." We are totally dependent on these much-maligned professions.

After two well-publicized coal mining disasters this year, the coal mines of West Virginia have received lots of unfavorable publicity. But this has focused mainly on underground mining. A bigger, and growing, phenomenon has been "mountaintop" mining, in which the overburden, sometimes a hundred feet or more, is removed, the coal stripped out, and the broken rock put back. If it has any virtue, it is that fewer miners will die underground.

I snagged this view of about 400 square miles of Boone and Raleigh counties in southwestern West Virginia on Google Earth. To see this area in GE, "fly to" Whitesville. The image is about a year old (Summer 2009), except for the brown rectangle, from an older image taken in Winter.

The gray areas tell the story. More than five percent of the landscape, which comes to at least 20 or 30 square miles, has been blasted, set aside, and stripped of coal. This kind of mining is now a major source of coal for making electricity. This is not just a WV situation, it is seen all up and down the eastern US. It is where we are getting the power for our air conditioning this summer, folks.

I looked at the historical imagery for some of these "removed mountains". The oldest images are about fifteen years old, and show much smaller and fewer areas of disturbance. Mountaintop mining has become a big thing in the opening years of the Twenty-First Century. In the US as a whole, about half the energy use is from coal. In the Northeast, it is closer to 75%. Although projected reserves are expected to last between 50 and 100 more years, there's a lot of mountainous country around here that'll be flat by the time that's done!

Like many people, I'm fairly addicted to air conditioning. It is likely to come to an end in my lifetime, mainly because, having used up half of the coal already, the cheap half, we will find its price continue to climb until nearly nobody can afford to cool their homes in summer, and I expect winter heating will gradually change in style also.

The working miners have another generation ahead of them, maybe two. It'll end someday, and by then, to see a mountain, you'll have to go somewhere that there never was any coal.