When Will The Coal Market Rebound

Mountianeer Enterprises once again received more bad new. At the beginning of this week I was told by one of my truck drivers that a Foreman where I was selling my AML coal informed him that Thursday, May 21, would be our last day. I contacted the man I broker my coal through and he wasn't aware of any such cut off but said he would check into it. Well yesterday the same truck driver said that now he was told we could ship coal through May 31. We'll this was confirmed by my broker yesterday evening. This is actually only 3 more days than originally thought. The plant don't take coal on Fridays and Monday the 25th is a Holiday so all I gained was 3 days. I actually sell my coal, I pretty sure, for less than the buyer can produce it themselves. But they don't want to purchase outside coal while they have mines of their own shut down. I understand what their thinking. This doesn't help my situation however. A year ago I had a couple of different companies begging me to produce more and painted such a good picture that I have now put myself between a rock and a hard spot. I'll get into more details on that later. See Ya.

IS THE END IN SITE FOR COAL?

An article in the Bristol Herald Courier this morning leads me to believe the answer is no. Apparently the Obama administration wants to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 80% by 2050. According to this article the last time they were that low was when the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock.I for one don't see this happening.

Mining Cutbacks

Mining continues to decline. Friday, May 8,2009, I was told to reduce my coal shipments to 6 truck loads per day, 4 days per week. There is no way I can do this for an extended period of time. If I'm unable to secure some more orders somewhere, I will be force to shut down and pursue a different line of work. Hopefully things will work out. As it stands I will have to lay off 3 more employees. That will leave my total man power at 4 for the mine and 3 truck drivers

Mountain Top Mining in West Virginia- Surface Mining/AML in Virginia

MOUNTAINEER #3 GOB PILE:

This photo shows the gob pile prior to any re-mining being done to clean it up.





I am an independent contractor but what happens to the larger companies like Alpha and Consol has an effect on my operation as well. I have sold a great deal of my coal to Alpha in Virginia. The coal market is really bad right now and my coal sales to Alpha have been terminated. Hopefully the coal market will return soon.

The Big Boys of Mining Get a W.
Check out this article from Reuter.

U.S. court overturns ban on West Virginia surface mining

By Steve James

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. Court of Appeals on Friday overturned a lower court ruling that had banned surface, or mountaintop, mining in West Virginia, according to court documents.

The ruling was hailed by the coal mining companies who have turned to mountaintop mining as an economical alternative to traditional underground mines in Appalachia where production is declining.

The environmentalists who brought the original case said they would assess their next legal move, but vowed to fight on against the mining method which basically slices the top off hills and mountains.

Stock in Massey Energy Co which brought the appeal with the U.S. Corps of Engineers, was up 7 percent in late trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

The 4th Circuit judges in Richmond, Virginia, reversed a ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Robert Chambers, who had found that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had not fully evaluated the potential environmental damage before approving permits for mountaintop mining for four mines operated by subsidiaries of Massey.

"We reverse and vacate the district court's opinion and order of March 23, 2007, and vacate the district court's injunction," Friday's opinion said.

It said that under existing regulations, the state of West Virginia has "exclusive jurisdiction over the regulation of surface coal mining and reclamation operations."

The appeal had been brought by Massey and the West Virginia Coal Association. Surface mines account for about one-third of coal from West Virginia and half of that from Kentucky.

"We're pleased with the court's decision," said Roger Hendriksen, director of investor relations for Massey.

Judge Chambers had originally ruled in favor of a petition filed by a number of groups led by the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition. (OVEC)

Basically, OVEC contended that the Corps of Engineers had violated the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. Since then, the Corps has effectively frozen so-called 404 permits for surface mining.

Janet Keating, executive director of OVEC said: "We are deeply disappointed with the court's decision. We will assess our next step, but obviously we will continue to organize against surface mining."

In their ruling the appeals judges said basically that the Corps of Engineers had acted within regulations in place. "We cannot say that the Corps' assessments of stream functions in the challenged permits were arbitrary and capricious.

"It is not our place to dictate how the Corps should go about assessing stream functions and losses," they said.

Analysts had said if the ruling was upheld, Appalachian coal prices could spike and producers with a significant amount of surface exposure in Appalachia could get hurt.

Several mining companies -- Massey, International Coal Group, Alpha Natural Resources and Patriot Coal Corp -- would lose production if the ruling went against the miners, the analysts said.

One analyst Mark Morey, director of power systems strategy for Allstom Co Ltd said investors might hold off until the issue had been definitively resolved.

"Decisions like this are long term, so if you have any uncertainty, that's still gonna guide what your investment is.

"Does this 'overturn' mean they can have a whole new round of capacity? People have been thinking this decision might be held up anyway so they've been making decisions for the past two years with this hanging over their heads."

Several mining companies -- Massey, International Coal Group, Alpha Natural Resources and Patriot Coal Corp -- would lose production if the ruling went against the miners, the analysts said.

One analyst Mark Morey, director of power systems strategy for Allstom Co Ltd said investors might hold off until the issue had been definitively resolved.

"Decisions like this are long term, so if you have any uncertainty, that's still gonna guide what your investment is.

"Does this 'overturn' mean they can have a whole new round of capacity? People have been thinking this decision might be held up anyway so they've been making decisions for the past two years with this hanging over their heads."

(Reporting by Steve James; editing by Carol Bishopric)

Mining: More Pitfalls

Once again the dreaded happens. As my luck would have it I received a call on my cell phone just after 5:00 am Friday morning, May 1, 2009. If you're in your own business this will usually cause your heart to skip a beat or two. This call was one of my Coal Truck drivers calling to tell me that another one of my drivers just turned his truck over while dumping a load of coal. This type of incident is not all that uncommon especially with the type of product I get when I re-mine old gob piles. Fortunately the driver wasn't injured put several thousand dollars of damage was done and I lose the income that truck would bring in for several weeks or months. I wasn't able to get a photo of this particular incident except on a text sent to me so I'm attaching a picture of a different turn over I had with another truck identical to this one. The only difference is where the incident occured and the one yesterday took the tractor completely over on its side. The incident in part yesterday was due to an unlevel dumping site on which 3 trucks counting mine have turned over in the past 2 months.

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