(The following article by Ray Reed was posted on the Roanoke Times website on February 3.)
ROANOKE, Va. — Norfolk Southern generates one-fourth of its revenues from mining operations.
Virginia’s coal-related businesses, including the Norfolk Southern Railway, hardly seemed to notice Thursday that West Virginia was talking about intensifying the safety measures in its coal mines.
“We do not expect the safety stand-downs to affect our operations,” said Robin Chapman of Norfolk Southern.
The railroad was expecting the safety inspections to interrupt work in the mines for only a couple of hours, Chapman said.
Norfolk Southern generates one-fourth of its revenues from mining operations.
Those operations appeared to be affected more by conditions at the company’s coal-loading facilities at Lambert’s Point in Norfolk, because hundreds of loaded coal cars were parked in Roanoke on Thursday, waiting to move on.
In Southwest Virginia’s six coal-producing counties — Buchanan, Dickenson, Wise, Tazewell, Russell and Lee — about 100 active surface and underground mines continued to operate.
It has been 15 months since Virginia’s last confirmed fatal mining accident, according to the state’s Department of Mines, Minerals, and Energy.
In the past six years, Virginia has had 17 coal mine-related fatalities, said Mike Abbott, public relations manager for the agency.
Most of those were single-fatality accidents, usually involving machines or electricity. They did not trap miners underground or generate headlines in news media beyond the coal fields.
Had there been a halt to coal production in West Virginia, it could have affected railroads and electric utility companies only if the shutdown lasted for weeks.
Much of the coal that Norfolk Southern hauls through Roanoke comes from mines in Virginia and Kentucky.
“System-wide, we serve 142 active mines,” Chapman said. Forty-nine of those mines are in West Virginia, although some of that number may be inactive, he said.
West Virginia has 544 total mines.
“About half of the coal that comes out of West Virginia passes through Roanoke on its way to utilities and export markets,” Chapman said.
The railroad profits from coal in two ways. Its Pocahontas Land Co. division owns or manages more than 1 million acres of natural-resource reserves in Alabama, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.
The railroad collects royalties from mining operators who lease those reserves, and it earns money from hauling the coal.
Most of the coal is exported or shipped to utility companies. One of the biggest users of the coal moving through Roanoke is Duke Power Co., which has eight coal-fired generators in North Carolina. Those plants supply power to half of Duke’s 2 million customers, and they typically stockpile a month’s supply of coal.