Fact: Mountaintop removal strip mining is so profitable for the coal companies precisely because it replaces most of the need for labor with highly destructive, but nonetheless efficient, explosives and machinery. Although coal production rose 32 percent between 1987 and 1997, mining jobs dropped by 29 percent over the same period.
Source: Citizens Coal Council
Fact: The number of people employed by the coal industry in West Virginia peaked around 1940 at over 130,000 people employed, producing approximately 130,000 short tons of coal annually. By 1997, less than 20,000 people were being paid by coal companies to produce over 180,000 short tons of coal annually.
Source: Coal Productivity, WV Office of Miners Health, Safety & Training Fact: Tourism pumps far more money into West Virginia economy each year than does the coal industry.
Source: Citizens Coal Council
Fact: Surface mining (which includes MTR mining), accounts for only 1.2% of jobs in WV and brings in just 2.6% of the state’s total revenues. The counties where surface mining predominates are some of the still poorest counties in the country.
Source: 2002 economic census data; Fact: The Appalachian Highlands are characterized by some of the best and most diverse forest habitats in the world. Current reclamation practices are unable to restore native mixed hardwood forests, but rather replace these ecosystems with fields of non-native grasses. These changes in habitat may significantly impact neotropical bird populations, native salamander populations and other sensitive species.
Source: Trial Lawyers for Public Justice
Fact: The “Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act and the Clean Water Act do not
require that sites forested prior to mining would be reforested as a part of the post mining reclamation requirements.”
Source: US Environmental Protection Agency Fact: Reclamation is usually done late in the mining process for ease of operation. In order to reduce the size of valley fills and reduce reclamation costs, coal companies should reclaim the land contemporaneously with mining.
Source: Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition
Fact: Valley fills are built from the top down. If valley fills are constructed from the bottom up, they will shrink in size due to leveling and compaction.
Source: Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition
Fact: Slurry produced by coal mining contains dangerous heavy metals, including: Antimony, Beryllium, Cadmium, Chlorine, Chromium, Cobalt, Lead, Manganese, Nickel, Selenium, Arsenic and Mercury.
Source: US Geologic Survey
Fact: In the Appalachian Plateau, iron and manganese concentrations exceeded US Environmental Protection Agency drinking water guidelines in at least 40% of the wells, and about 70% of the wells near reclaimed surface coal mines.
Source: US Environmental Protection Agency Fact: Over 300,000 acres of West Virginia have received surface mine permits. Less than 1 percent of mined land is currently reused for any development purpose.
Source: Razing Appalachia, by Maryanne Vollers, Mother Jones: July/August 1999 Issue
Fact: At the present rate of development, this is enough developable land to last 3,000 years. As of 2002 in the Coal River Basin area of West Virginia alone, there were 95,000 acres of flat land lying 600-800 feet above the existing infrastructure. This is enough land to build:
- 10 One hundred acre prisons
- 5 Five thousand acre parks
- 50 Shopping malls
- 400 Fifty acre schools
- 100 One hundred acre trailer parks
Source: Rick Eades, Speech at the Coal Summit, Charleston, WV, June 2002. Fact: “In the northern and central Appalachian Basin coal regions… Sufficient high-quality, thick, bituminous resources remain in these beds and coal zones to last for the next one or two decades at current production.”
Source: US Geologic Survey 
