County Coal Data
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County Coal Data and Maps
The Coal Resource Maps include structural elevation, depth, thickness, sulfur, and chlorine maps of the Colchester, Danville, Davis, Dekoven, Herrin, Jamestown, Seelyville, and Springfield Coals.
The Coal Mine Maps are maps compiled by the ISGS of known mines: underground and surface coal mines as well as underground industrial mines. Buffer regions for industrial mineral underground mines were incorporated into the maps due to limited information regarding these mines. The size of the buffer region is dependent on the uncertainty or inaccuracy of the mine location based on the quality of the source material. For more information regarding industrial mines please contact the ISGS Industrial Minerals Section.
The accompanying coal mine directory for each county provides basic information about the coal mines. Coal has been mined in 77 counties in Illinois and more than 7,400 coal mines have operated since commercial mining began in 1810. Our maps of known mines for each of these counties may help the public to identify mined areas. Please note, however, that the accuracy and completeness of the mine maps and directories vary depending on the availability and quality of source material. Little or no information is available for many mines, especially the older ones, because mining activity was not regulated or documented until the late 1800's. Even then, reporting requirements were minimal.
In cooperation with the Illinois State Geological Survey, the Office of Mines and Minerals (a division of the Department of Natural Resources) is in search of old underground mine maps of Illinois. Many of the undocumented maps are believed to be in libraries, historical societies and personal files of old mine employees. The Department asks that anyone who knows of one of these maps, please contact the Department at (618) 650-3197 or by emailing brent.guttmann@illinois.gov(link sends e-mail). A map specialist will come to your location, if you wish. Otherwise maps can be mailed, or you may stop by one of our offices in Edwardsville, Springfield, Ottawa, or Benton. These maps will be checked against our existing inventory. If found to be a new discovery, they will be electronically imaged and returned to the owner (if requested).
The Coal Logs are non-confidential coal log descriptions from the Coal Section's stratigraphic database located in the county. These are part of the basis for the coal resource maps.
NOTE: A 1:100,000 scale county mine map with directory is available for purchase and can be ordered by contacting the ISGS at (217) 244-2414, or email at sales@prairie.illinois.edu(link sends e-mail). A 1:24,000 scale color plot version of each available quadrangle with directory is also available for purchase.
The County Coal Resource maps have been supported, in part, by the contract Maintenance of Coal Resource and Mine Data from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, Office of Mines and Minerals. Note: These maps are made available at this time in draft form only. They have not yet been reviewed to the normal standards of the Illinois State Geological Survey (ISGS) review process. They are made available in this manner as an "open file" in order to deliver products to our customers as fast as possible and to meet particular needs that we have encountered in public requests for this information.
These maps are PDF files, requiring Adobe Acrobat™ for viewing. (Download Acrobat).