Dominion Energy's Chesterfield Power Station is one of four locations across the state that are subject to new coal ash pond closure restrictions under the compromise legislation passed by the General Assembly and signed by the governor. (Photo by Ryan M. Kelly)

Coal as a source of power generation may go to the dust pile of history, but its ashes are destined to last longer-and, some people hope, it may become the cornerstone of future electricity and many other important products. 

The by-products of coal-fired power generation are a recognized environmental responsibility. Millions of tons of coal ash—a collective term for ash, boiler slag, sludge, and other coal-fired power plant residues—have been stored in ponds and landfills across the United States. Virginia has more than 26 disposal sites, 5 of which are still active.

High-profile leaks occurred in the reservoirs of Tennessee in 2008 and North Carolina in 2014. Coal ash contains arsenic, mercury and cadmium and other heavy metals that may pollute water sources, so it was put on the national environmental agenda. The latter caused the leakage of thousands of tons of coal ash and millions of gallons of contaminated water into the Dan River in Virginia and North Carolina.

Now, researchers and state and federal officials hope to use industrial waste streams to build some key components of a new energy system based on renewable energy and batteries: rare earth elements and key minerals such as aluminum, cobalt, lithium, and titanium.

"The entire green energy industry relies heavily on a range of key minerals," said Michael Kamis, director of the Virginia Center for Coal and Energy Research at Virginia Tech. 

As countries take measures to reduce carbon emissions, the demand for rare earth minerals is expected to soar. A report by the International Energy Agency found that to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius, it would require “four times the mineral demand for clean energy technologies by 2040”. The administration of President Joseph Biden estimates that by the same year, global demand for lithium and graphite used in batteries will increase by 4000%. 

“The desktop computers we used in the 1980s extracted about 15 elements from the periodic table,” said David Spears, director of the Department of Geology and Mineral Resources at the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals, and Energy. "Now, especially for smart screens and touch screens, these devices require about 75 elements." 

Digital devices are not the only big consumers of minerals and rare earths. According to the International Energy Agency, electric vehicles require 6 times the minerals of internal combustion engine vehicles, and onshore wind energy facilities require 9 times the minerals of natural gas plants. 

However, most of these resources currently come from China-China not only mined about 60% of the world's rare earths in 2019, but also processed nearly 90% of them.  

As the decarbonization race accelerates, officials are increasingly looking for domestic sources of these commodities. Studies have shown that rare earths and key minerals are present in coal by-products and other geological deposits, but it turns out that it is more difficult to extract them on a commercial scale. 

Starting this summer, Virginia will become a testing ground for wider deployment of this idea. In April, the U.S. Department of Energy allocated US$1.5 million to the Virginia Coal and Energy Center to lead a team not only to study the extraction and processing of rare earth elements and key minerals from coal and coal by-products in the central Appalachian Basin. Participants will include West Virginia University, University of Kentucky, state and federal agencies including DMME, and regional economic development groups. Spokesperson Teresa Hall said in an email that Dominion Energy will also provide assistance, although Appalachian Power will not be involved. 

"There is an opportunity to take environmental responsibility and turn it into an environmental asset," Kamis said. "All major mining companies are pushing this big era." 

The term "rare earth" is a bit misnomer, but it's actually not uncommon. This label is given to 17 metal elements, which are highly similar to each other and are often found together in nature. The U.S. Department of the Interior classified these elements as an entry in a list of 35 "critical minerals" in 2018, which are "critical to national security and economic prosperity." In short, these elements are considered vital, not only because they have a wide range of economic and military uses, but also because the United States relies heavily on foreign imports to obtain them. 

Appalachia may offer special hope: In 2016, Duke University researchers found that compared with fly ash from other coal basins in the United States, fly ash from Appalachian coal (a type of coal) Fine-particle coal ash) has a higher concentration of rare earth elements. Therefore, the researchers concluded that in any effort to recycle rare earths, "the ashes from the Appalachian region should be given priority." 

For Virginia, like other states in the region, there is an additional motivation for mineral exploration: economic development. 

As the popularity of thermal coal—the coal used for power generation—decreased, regions with an economy based on resources like southwestern Virginia found their foundations increasingly unstable. 

As the fourth largest coal-dependent region in the United States, coal employment and production in southwestern Virginia have fallen sharply. Over the past two decades, tonnage has fallen by more than 70%, from 33.3 million tons in 2000 to 9.9 million tons in 2020, while the number of employed people has been reduced by more than half, from 4948 workers to 1,878 workers. Even if reserves of high-quality metallurgical coal for steelmaking were discovered, this decline could not be prevented. 

"I think we all see that there will be less and less demand for thermal coal written on the wall," Spears said. "And I think all of us, especially at DMME, are looking for ways to diversify the economic opportunities in southwestern Virginia, which is a potential thing.

"Imagine if we find that some of these waste coal piles contain large amounts of key minerals," he added. "We can go back and mine them again and clean them up." 

In the deliberations on coal ash removal, state lawmakers have shown a preference for reuse. An important law in 2019 requires the recovery of at least a quarter of coal ash from ponds or landfills in the Chesapeake Bay Basin. 

So far, the construction industry has been the biggest beneficiary of coal ash reuse. The waste can be reused to make concrete, cement, wallboard and other materials. In January of this year, Dominion announced that it had signed a contract with Charah Solutions, headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky, to produce Portland cement using 8.1 million tons of coal ash from Chesterfield Power Station, which is the most commonly used cement type in the world. 

Karmis said whether the ashes can be recycled for construction purposes and minerals on a commercial scale. 

However, environmental groups have taken a more cautious approach to the possibility of mining.

Although the reuse of coal ash has become a popular strategy for waste disposal, efforts to obtain rare earths and key minerals from it “should not ignore legitimate concerns about how ash disposal affects neighboring communities and the environment,” said Jamie Brunko. A senior advocacy manager for James Riverkeeper and the James River Association, he has been closely involved in the issue of coal ash removal in Virginia. 

He wrote in an email: "At present, the extraction of rare earth elements requires processing and the use of acids, which may generate new and worrying waste streams on a commercial scale." "Considering the toxicities in coal ash Element, research should assess the risks inherent in the technology and its applications." 

Chelsea Barnes, the legislative director of Appalachian Voices, an environmental and consumer protection non-profit organization, also warned in an email that “it’s very dangerous to expose workers directly to these materials to extract key minerals and other elements. She pointed out that many of the workers involved in the cleanup of the Kingston spill have died or contracted cancer and other diseases; more than 200 people have sued the cleanup contractor. 

Coal ash is not the only potential source of rare earths and key minerals. Both can be found in other deposits to varying degrees. 

DMME's Department of Geology and Mineral Resources has identified four key minerals, including rare earth elements, which have "great potential for economic and commercial development" in Virginia, and 13 minerals with "medium potential". Some development work has already begun: five areas in Henry, Roanoke, Amherst, Nelson, Dinwiddie and Greensville counties have mined or explored rare earth elements. 

Another potential target might be the beach. In July of this year, with funding from the US Ocean Energy Administration, the department will conduct a desktop study of technologies that can be used to extract minerals from beach sand, whether it is during dredging or transportation. 

"The beaches on the Atlantic coast, especially those close to the estuary, contain a high percentage of these dark minerals, which contain rare earth elements," Spears said. 

Once the contract negotiations with the Department of Energy are completed, the first phase of the research led by Virginia Tech is expected to begin this summer. Subsequent stages will depend on discoveries about the locations and quantities of key minerals and rare earths that can be found in the coal fields of Central Appalachia and whether they can be extracted.

"We have always been interested in the materials necessary to support our civilization," Spears said. "And Virginia happens to be lucky to have a huge variety of industrial minerals."  

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Written by Sarah Vogelsong, Virginia Mercury July 7, 2021

Coal as a source of power generation may go to the dust pile of history, but its ashes are destined to last longer-and, some people hope, it may become the cornerstone of future electricity and many other important products. 

The by-products of coal-fired power generation are a recognized environmental responsibility. Millions of tons of coal ash—a collective term for ash, boiler slag, sludge, and other coal-fired power plant residues—have been stored in ponds and landfills across the United States. Virginia has more than 26 disposal sites, 5 of which are still active.

High-profile leaks occurred in the reservoirs of Tennessee in 2008 and North Carolina in 2014. Coal ash contains arsenic, mercury and cadmium and other heavy metals that may pollute water sources, so it was put on the national environmental agenda. The latter caused the leakage of thousands of tons of coal ash and millions of gallons of contaminated water into the Dan River in Virginia and North Carolina.

Now, researchers and state and federal officials hope to use industrial waste streams to build some key components of a new energy system based on renewable energy and batteries: rare earth elements and key minerals such as aluminum, cobalt, lithium, and titanium.

"The entire green energy industry relies heavily on a range of key minerals," said Michael Kamis, director of the Virginia Center for Coal and Energy Research at Virginia Tech. 

As countries take measures to reduce carbon emissions, the demand for rare earth minerals is expected to soar. A report by the International Energy Agency found that to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius, it would require “four times the mineral demand for clean energy technologies by 2040”. The administration of President Joseph Biden estimates that by the same year, global demand for lithium and graphite used in batteries will increase by 4000%. 

“The desktop computers we used in the 1980s extracted about 15 elements from the periodic table,” said David Spears, director of the Department of Geology and Mineral Resources at the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals, and Energy. "Now, especially for smart screens and touch screens, these devices require about 75 elements." 

Digital devices are not the only big consumers of minerals and rare earths. According to the International Energy Agency, electric vehicles require 6 times the minerals of internal combustion engine vehicles, and onshore wind energy facilities require 9 times the minerals of natural gas plants. 

However, most of these resources currently come from China-China not only mined about 60% of the world's rare earths in 2019, but also processed nearly 90% of them.  

As the decarbonization race accelerates, officials are increasingly looking for domestic sources of these commodities. Studies have shown that rare earths and key minerals are present in coal by-products and other geological deposits, but it turns out that it is more difficult to extract them on a commercial scale. 

Starting this summer, Virginia will become a testing ground for wider deployment of this idea. In April, the U.S. Department of Energy allocated US$1.5 million to the Virginia Coal and Energy Center to lead a team not only to study the extraction and processing of rare earth elements and key minerals from coal and coal by-products in the central Appalachian Basin. Participants will include West Virginia University, University of Kentucky, state and federal agencies including DMME, and regional economic development groups. Spokesperson Teresa Hall said in an email that Dominion Energy will also provide assistance, although Appalachian Power will not be involved. 

"There is an opportunity to take environmental responsibility and turn it into an environmental asset," Kamis said. "All major mining companies are pushing this big era." 

The term "rare earth" is a bit misnomer, but it's actually not uncommon. This label is given to 17 metal elements, which are highly similar to each other and are often found together in nature. The U.S. Department of the Interior classified these elements as an entry in a list of 35 "critical minerals" in 2018, which are "critical to national security and economic prosperity." In short, these elements are considered vital, not only because they have a wide range of economic and military uses, but also because the United States relies heavily on foreign imports to obtain them. 

Appalachia may offer special hope: In 2016, Duke University researchers found that compared with fly ash from other coal basins in the United States, fly ash from Appalachian coal (a type of coal) Fine-particle coal ash) has a higher concentration of rare earth elements. Therefore, the researchers concluded that in any effort to recycle rare earths, "the ashes from the Appalachian region should be given priority." 

For Virginia, like other states in the region, there is an additional motivation for mineral exploration: economic development. 

As the popularity of thermal coal—the coal used for power generation—decreased, regions with an economy based on resources like southwestern Virginia found their foundations increasingly unstable. 

As the fourth largest coal-dependent region in the United States, coal employment and production in southwestern Virginia have fallen sharply. Over the past two decades, tonnage has fallen by more than 70%, from 33.3 million tons in 2000 to 9.9 million tons in 2020, while the number of employed people has been reduced by more than half, from 4948 workers to 1,878 workers. Even if reserves of high-quality metallurgical coal for steelmaking were discovered, this decline could not be prevented. 

"I think we all see that there will be less and less demand for thermal coal written on the wall," Spears said. "And I think all of us, especially at DMME, are looking for ways to diversify the economic opportunities in southwestern Virginia, which is a potential thing.

"Imagine if we find that some of these waste coal piles contain large amounts of key minerals," he added. "We can go back and mine them again and clean them up." 

In the deliberations on coal ash removal, state lawmakers have shown a preference for reuse. An important law in 2019 requires the recovery of at least a quarter of coal ash from ponds or landfills in the Chesapeake Bay Basin. 

So far, the construction industry has been the biggest beneficiary of coal ash reuse. The waste can be reused to make concrete, cement, wallboard and other materials. In January of this year, Dominion announced that it had signed a contract with Charah Solutions, headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky, to produce Portland cement using 8.1 million tons of coal ash from Chesterfield Power Station, which is the most commonly used cement type in the world. 

Karmis said whether the ashes can be recycled for construction purposes and minerals on a commercial scale. 

However, environmental groups have taken a more cautious approach to the possibility of mining.

Although the reuse of coal ash has become a popular strategy for waste disposal, efforts to obtain rare earths and key minerals from it “should not ignore legitimate concerns about how ash disposal affects neighboring communities and the environment,” said Jamie Brunko. A senior advocacy manager for James Riverkeeper and the James River Association, he has been closely involved in the issue of coal ash removal in Virginia. 

He wrote in an email: "At present, the extraction of rare earth elements requires processing and the use of acids, which may generate new and worrying waste streams on a commercial scale." "Considering the toxicities in coal ash Element, research should assess the risks inherent in the technology and its applications." 

Chelsea Barnes, the legislative director of Appalachian Voices, an environmental and consumer protection non-profit organization, also warned in an email that “it’s very dangerous to expose workers directly to these materials to extract key minerals and other elements. She pointed out that many of the workers involved in the cleanup of the Kingston spill have died or contracted cancer and other diseases; more than 200 people have sued the cleanup contractor. 

Coal ash is not the only potential source of rare earths and key minerals. Both can be found in other deposits to varying degrees. 

DMME's Department of Geology and Mineral Resources has identified four key minerals, including rare earth elements, which have "great potential for economic and commercial development" in Virginia, and 13 minerals with "medium potential". Some development work has already begun: five areas in Henry, Roanoke, Amherst, Nelson, Dinwiddie and Greensville counties have mined or explored rare earth elements. 

Another potential target might be the beach. In July of this year, with funding from the US Ocean Energy Administration, the department will conduct a desktop study of technologies that can be used to extract minerals from beach sand, whether it is during dredging or transportation. 

"The beaches on the Atlantic coast, especially those close to the estuary, contain a high percentage of these dark minerals, which contain rare earth elements," Spears said. 

Once the contract negotiations with the Department of Energy are completed, the first phase of the research led by Virginia Tech is expected to begin this summer. Subsequent stages will depend on discoveries about the locations and quantities of key minerals and rare earths that can be found in the coal fields of Central Appalachia and whether they can be extracted.

"We have always been interested in the materials necessary to support our civilization," Spears said. "And Virginia happens to be lucky to have a huge variety of industrial minerals."  

Virginia Mercury is part of the States Newsroom, a network of news organizations supported by the Alliance of Grants and Donors, and a 501c(3) public charity. Virginia Mercury maintains editorial independence. If you have any questions, please contact the editor Robert Zullo: info@virginiamercury.com. Follow Virginia Mercury on Facebook and Twitter.

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Sarah is Mercury's environmental and energy reporter, covering everything from utility regulation to rising sea levels. She is from McLean and has worked in journalism and academic publishing for more than ten years. She has previously worked as a reporter for Chesapeake Bay Journal, Progress-Index and Caroline Progress. Her work has been awarded the "Best Presentation Award" for online writing by the Virginia Press Association twice. She was selected into the 2020 cohort of the Columbia Energy Journalism College and graduated from the College of William and Mary. Contact her via [email protection]

From pushing for the removal of Confederate statues to a major shift in health care and energy policies, the old dominion is changing; fair and hard reporting on the policies and politics of Virginians that affect us all is more important than ever. Mercury aims to bring a new perspective to reporting on the state's biggest problems.

Our story may be republished online or in print under the Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. We ask you to edit or shorten the style only, provide an appropriate attribution and a link to our website.