Coal Industry Faces Labor Shortage
May 17, 2001 -- At the University of Kentucky, in the heart of Appalachia's coal country, only one student will be studying for a career in a coal mine when the class of 2005 converges on the campus next fall.
The university this spring graduated 10 students with degrees as mining engineers, down from dozens a generation ago. That's a worrisome trend for an industry basking in the reflective glow of an energy policy unveiled today that emphasizes more production and less regulation.
Just as the United States is calling for more coal, there are serious questions about who will mine it. "We have a labor shortage," said Bill Caylor, president of the Kentucky Coal Association.
So Appalachia's coal-mining towns, which have been slumping since the 1970s collapse of the energy-intensive steel industry, could miss out on the next boom.
‘Not a Pick-and-Shovel Industry Anymore’
The causes of the labor shortage are historical and complex, Caylor said, and there's no quick fix. It starts with the steady outmigration that is shrinking the labor pool throughout the coal belt. And it's harder than it once was to persuade those who stay to take a dirty and dangerous job in a coal mine with starting pay ranging from $11-$16 an hour.
"We're a high-tech industry, which people need to realize," Caylor said. "We're not a pick-and-shovel industry anymore."
Not everyone agrees that the labor pool is as shallow as the mine operators say it is.
"There's a lot of age-bias and anti-union sentiment out there," said Doug Gibson, a United Mine Workers spokesman, who said the union has lists of experienced people willing to work in the mines. But some mining companies are reluctant to bring back laid off or retired workers because of health-care liabilities stemming from mining-related black lung disease or other problems, Gibson said.
What's more, coal companies in Western states like Nevada and Wyoming are tapping surface deposits with more machines and fewer workers than are needed to mine the hills of Tennessee, West Virginia, Kentucky and Pennsylvania.
A New Generation
There's no question that coal plays a vital part in the U.S. economy and will do so for decades to come.
"More than half of the electricity generated in America todaycomes from coal," President Bush said in laying out an energy plan formulated by a task forced headed by Vice President Dick Cheney.. "If we weren't blessed with this natural resource, we would face even greater shortages and higher prices today. Yet coalpresents an environmental challenge. So our plan funds research into new clean coal technologies."
Bush pledged to fund research into ways to reduce the damaging carbon dioxide emissions associated with burning coal.
Coal's contribution to electricity generation has been steadily eroded over the past two decades by nuclear and natural gas, neither of which contribute as much as coal to global warming. Bush today said his plan anticipates that most new electric plants will be fueled by natural gas, which he called "the cleanest of all fossil fuels."
But if the Bush administration delivers on its earlier vow to ease emission standards for carbon dioxide, coal could stem its loss of market share.
Still, the industry must do something to find a new generation of workers to bring the coal out of the mines. Caylor cited two eastern Kentucky coal mining companies whose average employees are 47 and 49-years-old, respectively.
"There's going to be a great potential career in coal mining when the baby boom generation starts leaving the job market," said 52-year-old Caylor. "We have 15,000 coal miners today in Kentucky and we could easily hire 1,000 more," he said, as well as lab technicians, equipment operators and others needed to keep the coal coming out of the ground.
"The coal industry will probably very slowly continue to shrink," he added. "But we still need a lot of employees. We're not going away."