To West Virginia, and Appalachia more broadly, coal is what tea was to Chinese politics and culture in the mid-19th century. Wealth, identity and labor wars spun around plant matter carbonized ...

Elaine McMillion Sheldon writes, directs and narrates a documentary film about the cultural hold of coal in West Virginia, part of so many families’ histories, including her own.

For Appalachia to recover from the decline of coal, the region might need to look across the Atlantic and learn from the Welsh experience. The economic transition, however, won’t be easy, as ...

Explore the legacy of coal and its enduring influence on culture, industry, and regional identity.

This story was originally published by The Conversation. Central Appalachia is home to the third-largest concentration of forest carbon offsets traded on the California carbon market. But while these ...

In West Virginia, where 7 in 10 voters supported Trump last year and coal mines employed about 14,000 workers in 2023, the delay in new silica standards and worries about mine safety programs are ...

NPR's Scott Simon talks with Elaine McMillion Sheldon about her documentary, "King Coal." It's about Appalachia's deep economic and cultural ties to coal.

By comparison, all the mines in Central Appalachia produced just 17 percent of U.S. coal in 2011.

Patriot Coal Corp <PCX.N> said it will close one of its central Appalachia mines, located in southern West Virginia, resulting in the termination of all employees working there, effective Oct. 5.

West Virginia University's Water Research Institute runs this facility where rare earth minerals are separated from acidic groundwater draining from an abandoned coal mine, June 25, 2024, in Mount ...