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Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements , chiefly hydrogen , sulfur , oxygen , and nitrogen . [ 1 ]
Coal forest of tree ferns and lycopod trees, in a 1906 artist's rendering. The coal forests seem to have been areas of flat, low-lying swampy areas with rivers flowing through from higher, drier land. [4] When the rivers flooded, silt gradually built up into natural levees. Lakes formed as some areas subsided, while formerly wet areas became ...
Coal mining has been a very dangerous activity and the list of historical coal mining disasters is long. In the U.S., 104,895 coal miners were killed in mine accidents since 1900, [32] 90 percent of the fatalities occurring in the first half of the 20th century. 3,242 died in 1907, the worst year ever; in 2020 there were five. [33]
The History of coal mining goes back thousands of years, with early mines documented in ancient China, the Roman Empire and other early historical economies. It became important in the Industrial Revolution of the 19th and 20th centuries, when it was primarily used to power steam engines, heat buildings and generate electricity.
It is the most abundant rank of coal, with deposits found around the world, often in rocks of Carboniferous age. Bituminous coal is formed from sub-bituminous coal that is buried deeply enough to be heated to 85 °C (185 °F) or higher. Bituminous coal is used primarily for electrical power generation [1] and in the steel industry.
Coal forms when organic matter builds up in waterlogged, anoxic swamps, known as peat mires, and is then buried, compressing the peat into coal. The majority of Earth's coal deposits were formed during the late Carboniferous and early Permian. The plants from which they formed contributed to changes in the Carboniferous Earth's atmosphere. [25]
Since carbon (coal) is a good absorber of radiation, it might be possible to convert some abandoned underground coal mines in the upper Allegheny region to helium-creation plants by providing a ...
Pittsburgh-seam coal, especially the highest-quality coal found in the Connellsville district, was the best coal in America for making coke. When converted into coke, it was sufficiently strong to withstand the weight of iron ore that was piled with coke inside iron furnaces.