Skip to content
Research Article Open access CC BY 3.0

The Analysis of Coal Mining Impacts on West Virginia’s Environment

C. Edmund Merem, Peter Isokpehi, Joan Wesley, Emmanuel Nwagboso, Chandra Richardson, Siddig Fageir, Samu Iwehabura, Marshand Crislerq

Current Journal of Applied Science and Technology · pp. 1171–1197 · Published 14 Jan 2015

10.9734/BJAST/2014/7066

Abstract

Aims: The paper analyzes the impacts of coal mining activities on West Virginia’s environment using GIS. Study Design: Adopted a mixscale appoach. Methodology: The aproach is applied to GIS and primary data connected to descriptive statistics by analyzing the impacts of mining with data collected at the state, county and watershed level. Place and Duration of Study: The coal producing counties of West Virginia May 2010-December 2012. Results: The study shows changes in coal production, and widespread degradation resulting in land loss and open space, impacts on mountain ecosystem and water quality decline in the head waters and human casualities.The spatial analysis revealed the dispersion of mining activities onto senstive environments comprising of streams and mountain ecosystems. Conclusions: The assessment of these trends and the capability of GIS in pinpointing them enhanced our research and understanding of ecosystem vulnerability in the face of recurrent degradation induced by mining. GIS also provided a framework for assessing ecosystem decline. To remedy the problems, the paper offered suggestions ranging from corporate code of ethics to improved data infrastructure and more use of GIS in environmental decision making.

West virginia coal mining impacts environmental degradation GIS factors mountain top clearance.

References (10)

  1. 1 Cumulative impacts of mountaintop mining on an Appalachian watershed [DOI]
  2. 2 A comparison of the catchment sizes of rivers, streams, ponds, ditches and lakes: implications for protecting aquatic biodiversity in an agricultural landscape [DOI]
  3. 3 GIS and Remote Sensing Applications in the Assessment of Change within a Coastal Environment in the Niger Delta Region of Nigeria [DOI]
  4. 4 Deciding Alternative Land Use Options in a Watershed Using GIS [DOI]
  5. 5 GIS Based Analysis of Growth Management and Environmental Decline of the Central Mississippi Region [DOI]
  6. 6 Relationships between Climate Parameters and Forest Vegetation At and Near Digya National Park, Ghana [DOI]
  7. 7 Geospatial Assessment of the Impacts of Changing Agricultural Landscape in Louisiana
  8. 8 Watershed management for water quality protection: Are GIS and simulation models THE answer? [DOI]
  9. 9 Using Spatial Information Technologies as Monitoring Devices in International Watershed Conservation along the Senegal River Basin of West Africa [DOI]
  10. 10 Using Geospatial Information Systems in Analyzing Urbanization Impacts on Stream Habitats in Southern Mississippi Coastal Ecosystem

Cited by 6

Using big data for evaluating development outcomes: A systematic map

Francis Rathinam, Sayak Khatua, Zeba Siddiqui · Campbell Systematic Reviews: Better Evidence for a Better World · 2021

Showing 1 of 6 known citations — external sources report more than can currently be individually listed.

Related research

Article metrics

Real usage data collected on this platform.

46

Page views

0

PDF downloads

25

Outbound clicks

6

Citations

Views over time

Views by country

Approximate, from request IP at view time — not citizenship or institution. Countries with fewer than 5 views are grouped as "Other".

Traffic sources

Referring site, by host.

Views and downloads exclude known bots/crawlers. Citations combines this platform's own DOI-resolved index with each external source's own reported total — see Cited by above for individually listed citing works. Last refreshed 0 seconds ago.