The Viking Mine in Daviess County, Ind., shipped 1.5 million tons of coal in 2007, which was trucked to electricity generating and industrial customers including Indianapolis Power & Light's Petersburg Plant, Hoosier Energy's Ratts Plant, Lehigh Cement Co., and General Electric.

 

Viking Mine is a surface mine that uses truck/shovel fleets and dozers push to remove overburden. Coal is transported to the preparation plant for crushing and processing. The mine's approximately 140 employees work on two shifts per day, seven days a week year round and mine six different seams of coal. Viking has 8 million tons of assigned recoverable reserves.

 

Viking Mine is operated by Black Beauty Coal, the largest coal producer in the Illinois Basin. Black Beauty is a subsidiary of St. Louis-based Peabody Energy, the world's largest private-sector coal company, with 2007 sales of 238 million tons and $4.6 billion in revenues. Its coal products fuel approximately 10 percent of all U.S. electricity and more than 2 percent of worldwide electricity. The company is serving global coal demand from electricity generators and steelmakers, and is growing to serve new global customers and emerging Btu Conversion markets.