Anthracite Railroads-Any coal hauled out of NE Penn?

[081552]

I'm reading about the anthracite railroads in NE Penn such as thr Reading, Lehigh Valley, etc. Is there any coal still hauled out of this area by railroad or was it played out many years ago?

 Thanks!

[Anonymous]

My goodness they have never stopped mining anthracite in North Eastern PA. Schuylkill, Carbon, Luzerne. Northumberland, Lackawana, Columbia, Dauphin and Sullivan Counties still produce. At last check there was close to 8 billions tons of the stuff tht is mineable anthracite coal reserves.

I don't know how much they transport from the mines in rail cars since some of those mines are pretty small. I would suspect they truck most of it to a central point then ship some out west by train. 

[Anonymous]

Well the second part of your answer is heck yes they still ship by rail. here is a link.   LINK

[SealBook27]

Well the second part of your answer is heck yes they still ship by rail. here is a link.   LINK

   Could you please explain the chart a little bit?  I'm particularly interested in Tamaqua. 

 

[Anonymous]

This is the current hauling of anthracite coal by NS. RBMN would refer to the Reading Blue Mountain and Northern Railroad that operates about of track in the area fo Packerton, PA.

 Premium Fine Coals Inc, of Tamaqua was given $258,000 from the 2007 PA State Rail Freight assistance program this year for constuction of a loading and unlaoding facility for coal produced at their companies coal breaker.

[SealBook27]

   Thanks for the info.  Last month we rode thru the area on the Reading.  Now I understand what we saw south of Tamaqua.  I had no idea coal was still being shipped out of the area.  My mother's side of the family lived there and I heard quite a few stories about the mines (sinkholes, gas, underground fires).  But I got the impression that everything was pretty well tapped out.

  

[Anonymous]

The bulk of it is refuse mining. They are reclaiming the old coal that was considered junk in the past.

[al-in-chgo]

The bulk of it is refuse mining. They are reclaiming the old coal that was considered junk in the past.

I've only seen anthracite once, and that was at a collier's in New England that specialized in home-fuel coal (Franklin stove, Warm Morning furnace, etc.)  I was told that while genuine anthracite still exists, it has gotten expensive enough that it has few industrial uses and is too expensive for the whole-house ductwork type of furnace. 

Beautiful stuff.  So black it looked blue.  Not at all like the bituminous I grew up with.   - a. s.

 

[Anonymous]

Doesnt the EBT still move coal?

[Anonymous]

Hard Coal (Anthracite) is still a VERY popular source of heating fuel. Most systems in place for coal is hot water/boiler. While the price is a little inflated you have to remember it is a higher BTU than soft coal so you burn less. Most of these sytems use an auger feed so you don't have to attend them so often.

There is also a very popular rice coal burner sinilar to a pellet stove. There is still some forced air systems and free standing coal/wood stoves.

Hard coal is pretty easy to get in Western/Central Pennsylvania and the price per ton is anywhere from$180 to $200 a ton. An average house would use around 5 tons for the winter. I heat with 275 gallons of fuel oil and 3 tons of soft coal mixed with wood. In any event heating for a very cold Pennsylvania winter is $1,000 or less.

If your interested here is some information. --->  COAL 

 The EBT last shipped coal around 1956, however it is still in operations as a tourist train.