Initially, coal was primarily used as a domestic fuel up until the time of the industrial revolution. During the industrial revolution, coal became an integral part of the manufacturing and processing sectors since it was used for purposes of transportation, creating electricity, molding and heating purposes. However, large scale coal mining was introduced in the 18th century and during this time, Britain was the only country which was able to mine coal using advanced mining techniques. These techniques involved underground mining and excavation.
Initially, miners used to scrap coal off the surface using a range of processes such as shaft and drift mining. This has since been done for many centuries and since the demand for the commodity is still low in most parts of the world; such mining techniques are still able to cater for the current coal demand in the market. You can have a look at Lehigh Anthracite website so as to get an ideal of how the coal industry has performed over time and how you can get the most out of coal mining.
However, with time, the demand for coal has been rising exponentially over the past couple of decades. In fact, these developments are what resulted in the industrial revolution. Coal has since become a very popular fuel used for a myriad of purposes. The use of coal is definitely treated as important element in as far as creating electricity, transportation and manufacturing processes are concerned. This then allowed many industries to make use of less space but still boost their level of productivity.
The Coal Mining Process
One thing that is for sure is that the process of coal mining is not only difficult but complex as well. You need to understand that coal is a natural resource and a fossil fuel which occurs as a result of years of decays of plants and other living organisms underground. Some can also be found on the surface while most coal deposits are in essence found deep under the ground.
Coal extraction and mining is divided into two main processes. These are deep excavation and surface mining. The method of coal excavation depends on a number of factors such as depth of the coal deposits under the ground, topography, soil composition, climate and many other geological factors.
Surface mining on the other hand is used for purposes of scrapping off coal that is found near the surface. This can even be mountains of coal deposits which are extracted through the use of explosives and even blowing up of mountains then later on collecting the fragments and processing them. You can have a look at Lehigh Anthracite so as to appreciate how coal mining works.
Investing In Coal
There is no doubt that investing in coal will definitely be a safe bet. One thing that is for sure is that still there are large coal deposits across the globe. Due to its popularity, coal is still a much preferred fuel for many manufacturing processes. In that case therefore, any piece of investment that you choose to make in this particular industry will definitely be worthwhile.
