Brian Johnson's underground coal notes

There are five different methods of underground coal mining. The first type is the most common type of mining in West Virginia and it is shaft mining. You have probably seen these types of mines before because the only way to get down into the mine is to take an elevator straight down usually past 1,000 feet.  The advantages to shaft mining are that we can get a lot of coal out of the mines with huge machines that do all of the work but the bad thing is that a massive mine explosion could happen if the company isn’t carful.

 

Drift mining- Drift mining is another method of coal mining where the opening of the mine is in the side of the mountain instead of drilling down into the ground when the coal seam meets the surface. The coal miners mine horizontally into the coal seam in the mountain.  Drift mining is one of the easiest ways to mine but it is always not the safest because of the danger of collapsing roofs.

 

 

 

 

Room and pillar mining is an underground mining method where they cut out sections of the coal and leave “pillars” in many “rooms” of coal in parts so the coal will support the roof. The bad thing about these types of mines is the nearly half of the coal that is used for the pillars is left behind and there is a constant danger of the roofs collapsing on top of the miners. In room and pillar mining they can use fewer men to extract coal they can use continuous machines that constantly cut coal out of the mounting without the use of multiple miners.  It is a huge machine that has rotating steel drum tungsten carbide teeth that move 5 tons of coal per minute. Continuous miners are used in drift mining and room and pillar mining and have been around since the 1940’s. Click here to see a continuous miner.

The last method of underground mining is the long wall technique.  This method is highly effective because there are hydraulics machines that hold the roof up while they mine the coal and then after they are all done they retreat and let the roof collapse on itself. It is high effective but dangers of roof collapses are still high. 

LBJ's coal notes

                In class we are learning about coal in Appalachia and how it is formed and all of its purposes. The coal we are mining right now is from the Pennsylvania period 300 million years ago when swampy plants got buried under the ground with no oxygen to decompose them.  This absence of oxygen prevents total decay and forms peat which is like a moss that has a low heat let off. A different kind of coal is lignite. Sometimes called brown coal, lignite is low carbon concentrated and is found in in Alaska and western states but has a low heat value. The most common coal is Bituminous coal. It has a high carbon value and burns really hot. This is what we have been mining in our mines for many years now.  The byproduct of burning coal is what is called coke and it is primarily used in the steel industry.