(The following story by Jan Falstad appeared on the Billings Gazette website on September 2, 2009.)
BILLINGS, Mont. — Nearly half a century after the last commercial coal mine in the Bull Mountains closed, a handful of top U.S. executives joined Montana politicians in dedicating the new Signal Peak Mine south of Roundup.
In a week, the first coal train will be loaded and shipped from the mine, bound for a coal plant in Ohio owned by a utility called FirstEnergy.
Burlington Northern Santa Fe Chairman and Chief Executive Matt Rose came to Montana for the event. After years of talk about developing these vast coal reserves, the mine is a reality thanks to the combined efforts of two investors and help from state and local government, Rose said.
Gov. Brian Schweitzer and commissioners from Yellowstone and Musselshell counties rode in a posh six-car VI P train that BNSF brought in for the occasion. The train took 50 dignitaries and journalists from the Walter station near Broadview where the new spur joins the main BNSF railroad to the mine.
Cheers broke out in the light-hearted crowd as the mine came into site after the 35-mile ride north.
“This is as good as it gets,” Rose said.
Signal Peak is the first major underground coal mine constructed in the United States in many years and this is the first major BNSF rail spur constructed in decades, Rose said.
The rail spur cost $105 million with a total of $408 million invested in two massive coal silos, a wash plant, a long wall miner, ponds and other buildings and equipment. The mine employs 190 people and when fully operational next year could load and ship seven 120- to-150 car trains per day.
The Boich Group of Ohio and FirstEnergy are 50/50 partners in the project, after buying out the former Bull Mountain project in June 2008.
Several unsuccessful attempts were made beginning in the 1990s to bring the Montana coal reserves into full-scale production. Once the Ohio companies invested in the mine, the talk turned to action.
Construction started in August and in one year the rail spur was built and the mine site transformed from a couple of older buildings and trailer houses to a 21st century industrial complex.
Chief Executive Officer Wayne M. Boich Jr. said the Signal Peak Mine is the only coal mine his company owns right now.
“We’ve never owned mines in the West, so this is a new spot for us and it should be a big one,” Boich said.
The mine is going to be the most productive underground mine in the country that is running just one long wall miner, he said.