Coal: Fast Facts

Fast Facts About Coal

Courtesy of the National Mining Association http://www.nma.org/statistics/fast_facts.asp

U.S. Demand:

• Total demand for U.S. coal reached 1.05 billion tons in 2010.
  
• Nearly half of U.S. electricity is generated from coal.
  
• 9 out of every 10 tons of coal mined each year in the U.S. is used for domestic electricity generation.
  
• Each person in the U.S. uses 3.4 tons of coal annually.
  
• Coal is the most affordable source of power fuel per million Btu, historically averaging less than one-quarter the price of petroleum and natural gas.
  
• There are approximately 600 coal generating facilities (1,470 generating units) and 1,100 manufacturing facilities using coal in the U.S., according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).
• EIA estimates that 73% of all coal-based generating capacity was 30 years or older at the end of 2010.
• Coal accounts for about 30 percent of U.S. total energy production and 21 percent of total energy consumption.
  

U.S. Coal Production:

• Nearly 30 percent of U.S. mines are owned by public companies. Public companies produce approximately 75 percent of U.S. coal.
  
• The U.S.produces about 1 billion tons of coal annually.
  
• Approximately two-thirds of today's coal production results from surface, rather than underground, mining.
• Mountaintop mining in Appalachia contributes approximately 10 percent of all coal mined in the U.S. and is roughly 40 percent of the coal mined in West Virginia and Kentucky.
  

U.S. Reserves:

• The U.S. has nearly 261 billion tons of recoverable coal reserves, according to the Energy Information Administration.
  
• That's a 235-year supply at current rates of use.
  
• Coal accounts for approximately 94 percent of the nation's fossil energy reserve.
  
• Coal is found in 38 states, under 458,600 square miles-or about 13 percent of the nation's land area.

U.S. Coal Mining Employment:

• U.S. coal mining directly employs nearly 136,000 people;
  
• For each coal mining job, an additional 3.5 jobs are created elsewhere in the economy.
  
• The National Mining Association estimates 50,000 new employees will be needed in coal mining over the next 10 years to meet increasing demand and to replace retiring workers.
• The average coal miner makes $73,000 per year in wages.

U.S. Coal and the Environment:

• Power plants being built today emit 90 percent less pollutants (SO2, NOx, Particulates, mercury) than the plants they replace from the 1970s, according the National Energy Technology Laboratory.
  
• Coal plants in the 21st century emit 40% less CO2 than the average 20th century coal plant, according to the World Coal Institute.
  
• Regulated emissions from coal-based electricity generation have decreased overall by over 50 percent since the 1970s while coal use has tripled, according to government statistics.
  
• U.S. coal operations have reclaimed more than 2.3 million acres of mined land over the past 25 years.
  
• Since 1978, U.S. coal mines have paid more than $7 billion to reclaim mines that were abandoned prior to laws requiring reclamation.
  
• Approximately five million acres of land have been mined in the U.S. to produce coal; and most of the land not under active mining has been or is being reclaimed to the standards set by law.

U.S. Coal Transportation:

• Railroads move about two-thirds of U.S. coal shipments annually.
  
• Nearly all coal shipped by railroads is transported by unit trains, and the weighted average number of cars in a coal unit train was 117, according to the 2009 Waybill Statistics.
  
• Coal is the largest freight commodity moved by barges on the nation's inland waterways.

Fast Facts About Minerals

Courtesy of the National Mining Association http://www.nma.org/statistics/fast_facts.asp

U.S. Demand:

• Every American uses an average of 40,000 pounds of newly mined materials each year.
  
• Telephones are made from as many as 42 different minerals, including aluminum, beryllium, coal, copper, gold, iron, limestone, silica, silver, talc and wollastonite. Without boron, copper, gold and quartz, your digital alarm clock would not work.
  
• A television requires 35 different minerals, and more than 30 minerals are needed to make a computer.
  
• The construction industry accounts for approximately 51 percent of US copper demand.
  
• Silver's largest market use is for industrial applications, particularly as an electrical connector. Jewelry is the second largest use of silver.
  
• The Toyota Prius plug-in-hybrid requires about 50 pounds of rare earth metals for its motor and battery.

U.S. Mineral Production:

• The United States produced about 6 percent of the world's nonfuel nonferrous minerals in 2010.
  
• Processed materials of mineral origin account for about 4 percent of U.S. gross domestic product.
  
• The United States is the world's third-largest producer of gold, which in addition to jewelry, is used to make computer circuitry.
  
• America's copper mines rank third to Chile and Peru in production.
  
• The United States is the world's leading producer of beryllium, soda ash and sulphur.

U.S. Minerals Mining Employment:

• The National Mining Association estimates that in the next 5-10 years, the mining industry will need approximately 55,000 new miners across the U.S. to meet demand and to replace retiring mine employees. In addition, according to the Society for Mining Metallurgy & Exploration, at least 300 new mining and minerals engineering graduates are needed annually to keep up with projected growth.
  
• Nearly 500,000 people work directly in mining throughout the United States. Employment in industries that support mining, including manufacturing, engineer, environmental and geological consultants, accounts for nearly 1.8 million jobs.
  
• The average miner makes $64,000 per year in salary, not including overtime, bonuses and benefits.
  
• U.S. metal/nonmetal miners report 3.2 non-fatal injuries per 100 workers in 2009, a lower rate of occupational injuries than agriculture, forestry & fishing, construction, manufacturing, transportation, and retail trade.

U.S. Minerals Mining Economic Impact:

• In 2008, the mining industry paid approximately $45 billion in taxes, royalties and fees to federal, state and local governments combined. Nearly $107 billion was paid to mining industry employees in direct and indirect wages and benefits.
  
• The total direct and indirect impact of U.S. mining is valued at $1.9 trillion - mining produced $80 billion of finished mineral, metal and fuel products that were then transformed by consumer industries into goods creating an additional $1.8 trillion in value added.
  
• According to U.S. Geological Survey analysis, the value added to U.S. GDP by major industries that consume processed mineral materials was an estimated $2.1 trillion in 2010, 14 percent of U.S. GDP.
  
• Minerals and materials processed from minerals account for exports worth as much as $87 billion per year (USGS).

U.S. Minerals and the Environment:

• Mining has touched less than one-half of one percent of all the land in the United States.
  
• Only 3 million acres of public land have gone into private ownership from mining, while 94 million acres have been granted to railroads and 288 million acres privatized as agricultural homesteads (BLM).
  
• Since 1978, more than 2.6 million acres of mined lands have been restored to their original or better condition, as well as more than 285,000 acres of coal mines abandoned long ago.