Coal mining in the United States is a major industry, and reached an all-time high of 1.06 Gt (1.17 billion short tons) in 2008, being mined in 25 states. The US was a net exporter of coal in 2008, with the surplus of exports over imports equalling 4% of the total mined.[1]
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Twenty-six states produce coal.[2] The major coal-producing states are (in descending order as of 2000, with annual production in thousands of short tons):[3][4]
Total United States: 1,437,174
More than 90 percent of the annually-mined coal in the United States is used by the US electrical power industry.[5] Since 2000, the growth of coal-fired power generation has slowed considerably from what it was in the late 1990s.[6]
Coal accounts for about half of electricity production in the United States. In 2006, there were 1,493 coal-powered generating units at electrical utilities across the US, with total nominal capacity of 335.8 GW[7] (compared to 1024 units at nominal capacity of 278 GW in 2000).[8] Actual power generated from coal in 2006 was 227.1 GW (1.991 trillion kilowatt-hours per year),[9] the highest in the world and still slightly ahead of China (1.95 trillion kilowatt-hours per year) at that time.[10] In 2000, US production of electricity from coal was 224.3 GW (1.966 trillion kilowatt-hours per year).[9] In 2006, the US consumed 1,026,636,000 short tons (931,349,000 metric tons) or 92.3% of coal mined for electricity generation.[11]
In 2010 the United States produced 932 Mt hard coal and 65 Mt brown coal and exported 57 Mt hard coal. According to the IEA Key statistics the energy value of coal in the United States was in 2010 only 85 % compared to 2009. This change should be noticed in comparison of the national coal data as Mt or as TWh. Based on the big difference in the coal energy content it is recommended to confirm the table data from the official national statistics. In average the annual changes in the specific caloric values are small but do take place, e.g. Australia 0.689 (2009) and 0.614 (2008) and Russia 0.599 (2010) and 0.545 (2005). The lower the energy value, the more coal mining and fuel transportation is needed for the same energy quantity. New mining areas may also influence the specific emissions per TWh like sulphur emissions. According to the IEA the specific net calorific values of coal in the US were: [12]
| Coal in the US [13] | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Mt | toe/tonne | TWh | |
| 2009 | 997 | 0.641 | 7,432 |
| 2010 | 985 | 0.543 | 6,220 |
| Mtoe = 11.63 TWh Confirm from the national statistics. |
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At the peak of global warming's fame in the US [14] - especially in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and of Al Gore's receipt of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his promotion of belief in climate change - had temporarily raised public opposition to new coal-fired power plants.[15][16] Alongside this events, the anti-coal movement - both in the U.S. and internationally, especially in the UK and Australia - had made coal-fired power projects more politically costly, and tried to turn spurred further shifts in public opinion against coal-fired powertopublicity surrounding anti-coal campaigns.[17][18][19]
In an effort to counter this trend, many of the largest coal mining companies, electric utilities, and railroads in the U.S. launched, in 2004, a high-profile marketing campaign, convincing the American public that coal-fired power can be environmentally sustainable.[20][21][22] However, some environmentalists condemned this campaign as an example of "greenwashing": an attempt to use environmentalist rhetoric to disguise what they call" the inherently environmentally unsustainable nature of coal-fired power generation".[23] For example Australian environmental activist Tim Flannery thinks "Coal can't be clean".[24]
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