Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, September 9, 1995 TAG: 9509110066
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Norfolk Southern Corp. and the coal industry have genuinely tried to solve the problem of coal dust blowing off rail cars and onto homes and businesses but have more work to do, the chairman of a state legislative committee studying the problem said Friday.
"It's clear that Norfolk Southern has been very responsive and responsible and spent a lot of money on trying to address this problem," said State Sen. Elliot Schewel, D-Lynchburg. "I'd be less than truthful to say we are pleased with the results."
Schewel's committee is scheduled to make recommendations to the 1996 legislative session on the coal-dust issue. But Schewel, who is retiring from the General Assembly at the end of this year, suggested that the committee continue to function for another year to monitor the railroad's progress.
The General Assembly formed the committee after Sen. Madison Marye, D-Shawsville, sponsored a bill during the 1991 legislative session that would have required that the open-top coal cars be covered. Marye's measure followed complaints from residents in Bedford and Montgomery counties who said the coal dust damaged their homes, yards and automobiles.
The railroad argued that requiring tarpaulins on coal cars, as are required on open-bed trucks, would be impractical and dangerous. Instead, NS has sought a voluntary solution to the dust problem. This would avoid implementing new state regulations that might prove cumbersome and costly.
Five years ago, the railroad hired a Charlottesville consulting company, Simpson Weather Associates Inc., to help it study the problem. NS also has set up a toll-free hot line for the public to report complaints.
The railroad has concluded that 25 million tons, or 20 percent of its total annual coal haul, is responsible for the dust problem, said Bill Fox, an NS assistant vice president for coal marketing. The dusty coal is primarily that which is processed for use in steel mills, he said. Fox estimated that NS has spent $2 million studying the problem.
NS has succeeded in convincing the coal industry that the coal dust is a problem that needs to be dealt with, Fox said. The loss of coal, which can range from 300 to 400 pounds per car, is both a social and an economic problem, he said.
The company's research, Fox said, has led to two measures that are being used to control the dust - the shaping or "profiling" of coal as it's loaded into the cars so it is less prone to blow out, and the use of chemical "crusting" agents to harden the coal's surface.
The cost of the dust-control measures runs from $5 to $6 a car, or about 5 cents a ton, with the railroad picking up roughly a third of the tab and the coal companies two-thirds, he said. In some cases, he said, the value of the coal saved offsets the cost of controls.
Virginia's largest coal producer, Consolidation Coal Co. of Pittsburgh, which has three underground mines in Buchanan County, has experimented with both methods of control and found them to be effective, Bill Corder, a Consol spokesman, told the committee. The company intends to continue using both methods of control, he said.
Representatives of other major coal companies whose coal moves through the state, including Peabody and Pittston, also told the committee that they planned to use the dust controls. John Bryan of Pittston said the controls could prove more expensive for smaller companies that will have to do the work by hand.
Keith Stevens, assistant town manager of Altavista in Campbell County, said coal dust blowing from cars there has not been as bad as in the past. But he said the reason might be slower train speeds, the result of tracks incurring flood damage this summer.
Mary Williams of Rural Retreat in Wythe County told the committee Friday that dust became a problem there last fall. NS' tracks run next to a school and playground, and she said she's concerned for the children's welfare. Thick clouds of dust take 15 to 20 minutes to settle, she said.
Fox said NS had used surveillance cameras of an Altavista company near the tracks to identify the specific coal cars and thus the source of dust problems there. Rural Retreat's problem, he said, was traced to a West Virginia mine, which began using dust-control measures this week.
by CNB