A Report from Energy Ant—My Trip to the CONSOL Coal Mine in Kuhntown, Pennsylvania
On a visit to the CONSOL Corporation's Blacksville Number 2 mine in Kuhntown, Pennsylvania, we were in for several surprises! Chances are when you think of a coal mine, you think of dirty blackened men working in the dark with picks and shovels. Not so at this mine! About the only place you'll see a pick and shovel being used here is on the landscaping crew, not down in the mine digging for coal.
As we drove along beautiful winding country roads leading to the mine entrance we were in for our first surprise. After one last turn we came up a rise to small and very clean industrial area - the entrance to the Blacksville Number 2 mine. This neat compact area was a far cry from the images of the darkened and dirty coal towns further north in Pennsylvania!
We were met by the General Manager of the mine, the Assistant Superintendent, and by the mine's Human Resources Manager and then given a briefing on the mine and its operations before we were to be taken below ground. The General Manager began his briefing by telling us that coal mined at the Blacksville Number 2 mine is a small part of the Pittsburgh Number 8 Seam. The Pittsburgh Number 8 Seam extends from just north of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, south to Clarksburg, West Virginia and from just east of Appalachian Mountains and then in a westerly direction past the Ohio River and on into Central Ohio. The coal in the Pittsburgh Number 8 Seam consists primarily of bituminous coal, and, at least at this mine, is accompanied by fairly large amounts of methane and other associated gases. These gasses present several safety and operational issues, which contribute to higher costs required to recover the coal.
The Blacksville Number 2 Mine was started in the 1970's and since very early in its operational life has had effects in 2 states - Pennsylvania and West Virginia, where the exit for the mined coal is. Since the coal physically exits from the ground in West Virginia, West Virginia state mining laws govern the operation of the mine, regardless of where the actual digging is taking place. (Mining operations are also governed by Federal mining and occupational safety and health regulations.) Conversely, taxes are paid to each of the two states in proportion to the amount of coal taken from each state. Environmental impacts of the mine's operations are governed by both Federal laws and by the laws and regulations of the particular state effected. As you can imagine this does serve to complicate the operations of the mine a bit.
Generally, the Blacksville Number 2 mine operates 5 days per week beginning at 12:01 A.M. (One minute after midnight) on Sunday and using three shifts per day. During each shift about 100 people (both men and women) work below ground. Today's miner earns, on average, between $50,000 and $60,000 annually and is about 48 years old with 20 to 25 years experience in mining. The miner works 8½ hours per day, plus any overtime. During this whole time they stay underground, taking any meals and breaks inside the mine itself. Each shift overlaps the earlier shift by a ½ hour to allow for the crew that is ready to go home to tell the crew that is just about ready to start its day about such things as; how the machinery is operating that day, any safety issues, or anything else that needs to be passed along to all of the people working there. During the overlapping period between these two shifts there could be as many as 200+ men and women below ground.
At the time we visited the mine, operations were 800 feet below ground level. After we had put on our coveralls and safety equipment and been trained in how to use the safety equipment, we entered the elevator for our trip into the mine. This elevator was just like any other elevator you can find in any building, except instead of going up, it does down - underground.
Once we got to the bottom, we got into open trolley cars to go the 2 miles to the place where the actual work was being done. These trolley cars are the mines own small 'railroad' and help move people and some equipment around inside of the mine.
Fully 80% of the mine's output comes from the use of the long wall mining technique. In long wall mining a block of coal 850 feet wide and over 2 miles long is cut. This is done by cutting two parallel 2 to 2½ mile long tunnels, about 850 feet apart into the coal seam. These two tunnels are then connected by a third tunnel at the back of the block. All of this is done by conventional mining methods and this is where the remaining 20% of the mine's output comes from. It is at this point, once the two parallel tunnels have been connected that the actual long wall mining begins. The long wall mining machinery is then brought into this third tunnel at the back of the block of coal. The long wall mining machinery has three main parts to it: the shearer, the conveyor and the 'armor plating'. The armor plating provides the roof support so that the miners can have a relatively 'safe' place to work under.
The conveyor carries the raw coal away from the cutting surface, or the coal face, and to a series of larger conveyors that eventually carry the coal out of the mine. The third part is the actual workhorse. This part, the shearer, does the actual cutting of the coal from the coal face. The shearer has two rotating bits that cut into the coal face and works back and forth across the face, much like when you eat an ear of corn on the cob, except only this is way harder than the corn and much much dirtier. Every time the shearer goes across the face of the coal it cuts about 3½ feet into the face. It takes the shearer about a ½ hour to cut completely across the face just one time. The shearer can cut about 1,000 tons of coal each time it cuts across the coal face. The shearer is controlled by 2 operators (one for each bit) who use remote controls about the same size as the remote control for your TV to control the shearer. Each time the shearer finishes one pass across the face and begins its journey back across the face in the opposite direction the conveyor and the armor plating automatically move forward. As the long wall mining system moves forward, the roof behind where the work is being done is simply allowed to collapse. We weren't allowed to take any pictures while we were in the mine, which was a shame, because as the long wall mining system moves forward it looks like something straight out of the movie Star Wars. And the price tag for just one of these monsters is also out of Star Wars. In June 1998, CONSOL installed a new long wall mining system in the Blacksville Number 2 Mine at a cost of $25 Million.
A lot of money for a lot of coal. On the day before our visit the Blacksville Number 2 Mine produced 18,500 tons and had to have the long wall mining system idle for over five hours because of a backlog of mined coal. (This was a little under the daily average of 19,000 tons.) The long wall mining system can cut the coal faster than it can be hauled out of the mine. In order to handle the backlog and as a way of insuring that the long wall mining system runs as much as it can, CONSOL has just finished constructing a 2,000 ton underground raw coal storage bunker. It's the largest of its kind in the world.
The coal is moved from the underground raw coal storage bunker to the mine exit by a 4 mile long conveyor belt. This conveyor belt is operating 95% of the time (about 22 hours and 48 minutes of every day) the mine is working! Pretty amazing, especially when you remember that it is a REAL long belt and it is working in places that are really dirty. How many times does the dirty dish line at your school not work? Now think about trying to keep something 4 miles long working all the time. Until just recently that the Blacksville Number 2 Mine used real 34 ton Jefferies Train Locomotives (Engines) to carry the coal to the mine exit, but this wasn't as efficient as using the conveyor so they switched. Even still, it is kind of amazing to think of a train engine working 800 feet underground. Ever wonder how they got the train engines down there in the first place?
Once the coal has been hauled out of the mine it is taken to the 'Pig Plant' where the raw coal is separated by sizes and by whether or not it is marketable. 80% of the raw coal they mine is found to be marketable. The marketable coal is loaded into two very large silos and then hauled away by coal trains. CONRAIL provides coal trains of 100 to 130 rail cars. Each of coal trains can carry 10,000 to 13,000 tons of coal. It takes about 4 hours to load one of these coal trains. Most of these coal trains deliver the coal to utility plants that use it to generate either electricity or steam. In fact, the mine itself uses quite a bit of electricity, between $150,000 and $200,000 worth every month. Some of the coal mined at the Blacksville Number 2 Mine is exported, or sold, to other countries through the port of Baltimore.
Well, that's our trip to see a working coal mine. Hope you enjoyed it and if you ever get the opportunity to visit a coal mine, go and see one!
