Results of the first western coal availability study -- Hilight quadrangle, Powder River Basin, Wyoming

The US Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Bureau of Land Management, Geological Survey of Wyoming, and US Bureau of Mines, has produced an estimate of the amount of available coal in an area about 35 miles south of Gillette, Wyoming, where the Wyodak coal bed is, in places, more than 100 ft thick. Available coal is coal that actually is accessible for development under current regulatory, land-use, and technologic conditions. The first western coal availability study, in the Hilight quadrangle, has shown that approximately 60% (2.7 billion tons) of the total 4.4 billion tons of original coal resources in the quadrangle is available for development. Of this total 4.4 billion tons, 2.9 billion tons are contained in the Main Wyodak coal bed; 67% (1.9 billion tons) of this coal bed is considered available. Local coal-development considerations include dwellings, railroads, pipelines, power lines, wildlife habitat (eagles), alluvial valley floors, cemeteries, the Hilight oil and gas field, and the Hilight gas plant. Some of these considerations would be mitigated so that surface mining could proceed; others presently preclude mining in their vicinity.