(The Associated Press circulated the following on November 23.)
CASPER, Wyo. — Wyoming coal mines are trying to keep up with the railroads in shipping coal to power plants across the United States, an executive with coal producer Arch Coal Inc. said.
“A couple of years ago, we would’ve probably complained loudly about them, but today they’re doing a pretty good job both east and west,” Steven F. Leer, chairman and chief executive officer of St. Louis-based Arch, said in a recent interview. “Right now, I would suggest the coal industry is trying to keep up with them. Two years ago they were trying to keep up with us.”
Coal mined in the Powder River Basin in northeast Wyoming and southeast Montana is hauled by Union Pacific and Burlington Northern Santa Fe.
In 2006, UP hauled a company record 194 million tons of coal from the southern Powder River Basin. Last month, the company loaded 1,116 trains with Powder River coal, the third consecutive month UP has loaded coal onto more than 1,110 trains.
BNSF hauled a company record 287.2 million tons in 2006 out of the basin’s mines in Wyoming and Montana. This year, through Nov. 18, BNSF has loaded an average of 50.1 trains a day, an increase from the 49.4 trains loaded through the same period in 2006.
Leer noted that projections are that Powder River Basin coal mines will continue to increase production, perhaps reaching 600 million tons a year.
Arch Coal operates two coal mines in the Powder River Basin — Black Thunder and Coal Creek — in Wyoming.
“It is where the coal’s at in the United States,” Leer said. “If you look at Central Appalachia, which is the second largest producing basin in the U.S., the industry has been operating there for over a hundred years and the reserves are in a state of decline and its been slowly declining since its peak in 1997 or ’98.”
Leer said one of the challenges for the Wyoming mines is finding qualified workers in an area with a booming energy sector.
“I think for a young man or woman coming out of school, there’s going to be some tremendous opportunities now,” he said.