Patriot Coal Corporation is making major cutbacks to its thermal coal production with the announcement that it will idle the Highland mine located near Henderson, Kentucky, and the Dodge Hill Mining Complex located near Sturgis, Kentucky effective December 29, 2014.  The Heritage preparation plant and the barge loading terminal on the Ohio River are expected to continue processing and shipping coal from onsite stockpiles.

A decision regarding future coal production at these complexes will be made in conjunction with the company’s ongoing review of strategic options. These two sites together form the the company’s Illinois Basin operations, from which it sold 3.8 Mt of coal in 2013 and where it controls 596 Mt of proven and probable coal reserves, of which 106 Mt were assigned to current operations.

Patriot Coal Corporation is a producer and marketer of coal in the eastern US, with 10 active mining complexes in Appalachia and the Illinois Basin.  Patriot ships to domestic and international electricity generators, industrial users and metallurgical coal customers, and controls approximately 1.8 billion tonnes of proven and probable coal reserves.