Mountain Top Removal

Mountaintop ranoval/valley flu coal mining is, as the name implies, the removal of mountain top to recover coal from the seam(s) underneath. In the method, power shovels are used to dig into the soil for trucks to haul away after which a dragline is used to dig into the rock to expose the coal— explosives may also be used to make the overburden more amenable to removal. Other machines scoop out the layers of coal. 

Argali, G.O. Jr. (Ed.). 1979. Coal Exploration Proceedings of the Second International Coal Exploration 

Beamish, B.B. and Crosdale, P.J. 1998. Instantaneous outbursts in underground coal mines An overview and association with coal type. International Journal of Coal Geology, 35 27-55. 

Cassidy, S.M. (Ed.). 1973. Elements of practical coal mining. American Institute of Mining. Metallurgical and Petroleum Engineers Inc., New York. 

In Manual of Drilling Technology, A. A. Balkema (Ed.). Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Colinet, J.F., Rider, J.P., Listak, J.M., Organiscak, J.A., and Wolfe, A.L. 2010. Best practices for dust control in coal mining. Information Circular 9517. CDC/NIOSH Office of Mine Safety and Health Research. US Department of Health and Human Services, Washington, DC. 

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In mountainous areas (such as those in the Eastern United States), mountain top removal sites may be the only flat land, other than river flood plains, suitable for development of homes and town infrastructure. Whatever the intent, reclamation plans must be considered in advance of mining operations. While the real added cost of reclaiming mined land cannot be denied, it is often most cost effective to integrate reclamation into the mining. Where a mining company has not considered such factors as the need for topsoil or burial of salty or acid forming materials, the result has been sites that are difficult to reclaim. 

Mountain top removal (mountaintop removal) A form of surface mining in which the summit... 

Since valley fill invariably wound up in the streams that ran along valley floors, mountaintop removal operations also needed a dredge and fill permit from CoE. In 1991, CoE issued a nationwide permit that allowed mountain-top removal activities with minimal environmental impact to proceed with only cursory review. Under its very liberal interpretation of the word minimal, CoE required only about 7 percent of almost 1,000 removals per year to obtain full-fledged permits. ... 

Forests have been used unsustainably for millennia. Forests have been converted to pasture for livestock, used to smelt ores, or to manufacture timber, tar, and other products. Trees have been turned into charcoal and removed from mountain tops to mine the ores below. Forestry originated in attempts to prevent the overuse of forests. For example, in the eleventh century, William the Conqueror established forest laws governing the usage of vegetation and wild game. 

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