HENDERSON, Ky. - After days of rumors and speculation, Alliance Resource Partners L.P.'s headquarters in Oklahoma on Friday confirmed publicly that it will cease coal production effective Friday, Aug. 16, at the Dotiki Mine complex in Webster County.

The facility employs roughly 200 personnel and is operated by Alliance Resource Partner's subsidiary, Webster County Coal LLC.

The statement Friday from ARP said the closure was being carried out "in order to focus on maximizing production at its lower-cost mines in the Illinois Basin. After production ceases, the operation will engage in reclamation of equipment and infrastructure for an indeterminate time.

"Unfortunately, weak market conditions made this action necessary," said Joseph W. Craft III, chairman, president and chief executive officer of ARP. "We are saddened that production will be ending at the Dotiki Mine, which was opened in 1969 and is the oldest mine operated by ARLP."

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The Dotiki Mine complex has been been a mainstay of the economy in Webster County and the surrounding region for half a century.

A 2016 National Public Radio story about coal production in the U.S. cited the difficult work done by workers at Dotiki, but also reported that many of the miners there routinely pulled in pay of $100,000 and above yearly.

Steve Henry, Webster County judge-executive, told The Gleaner that the county will continue to look ahead.

"I can say that no matter what happens we are dedicated to making Webster County a community that is open for business. We feel that the I-69 corridor will bring lots of opportunities."

In a press release issued later Friday, Henry added:

"Dotiki Mine has been a major employer for Webster County for over 50 years. While we would like to have had them producing coal for 50 more, we realize that the coal market has made that unprofitable to continue. I am thankful that employees have an option to continue working (at other locations). Alliance coal has been a huge supporter of this community and I have been assured that will continue. While this will have a negative effect on our tax revenue, we had already been making changes to our budget over the last two years in anticipation of production ceasing.

"By doing so, our goal was to ensure the loss would not cause disruption of vital services to our residents. I commend the magistrates for that forward-thinking. We are still working to bring more economic opportunities to Webster County and we feel that those efforts will begin to bear fruit in the near future. At the same time I urge people to continue to support their local businesses. That will have the greatest impact."

Dotiki's numbers

The Dotiki underground mine complex is located near the city of Providence in Webster County, a city which has the silhouette of a miner on its logo and a life-size statue of a miner located in downtown.

According to the Alliance Resource Partner's website, "Dotiki utilizes continuous mining units employing room-and-pillar mining techniques to produce high-sulfur coal. Dotiki’s preparation plant has a throughput capacity of 1,800 tons of raw coal per hour."

Dotiki's workers produced 2.5 million tons of coal in 2018 and the company estimated underground reserves of nearly 78 million tons.

The coal industry

According to a December 2018 Associated Press story, "Americans are consuming less coal in 2018 than at any time since Jimmy Carter’s presidency, a federal report said Tuesday, as cheap natural gas and other rival sources of energy frustrate the Trump administration’s pledges to revive the U.S. coal industry.

"A report by the U.S. Energy Information Administration projected Tuesday that 2018 would see the lowest U.S. coal consumption since 1979, as well as the second-greatest number on record of coal-fired power plants shutting down."

Indeed, Dotiki had been a leading supplier of coal to Henderson Municipal Power and Light for years -- and HMP&L just this year closed their second and last coal-fired plant as the city utility looks to other sources such as solar, natural gas and open-market power purchases.

Dotiki Mine has also supplied the Tennessee Valley Authority, Louisville Gas and Electric Co. and other power producers.

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Dotiki history

Via The Gleaner's archives, some significant moments from Dotiki's 50 years in Western Kentucky:

1966: Mine operator Joe Davis opens the Dotiki Mine near Clay in Webster County.

1971: Fortune 500 oil company Mapco Inc. of Tulsa, Okla., enters the coal business and acquires Dotiki.

Oct. 15, 1984: A miner in a roof bolting machine is electrocuted when a loaded shuttle car struck an energized electrical cable that fell onto the bolting machine.

1986: Joe Craft, who studied accounting and law at UK, becomes president of Mapco Coal.

Dec. 14, 1988: A miner is killed in an underground tram accident.

June 1990: In the aftermath of the explosion that killed 10 miners at the Pyro Mining Co.'s William Station Mine near the Webster-Union county line in September 1989, Mapco conducts a large-scale mock mine disaster as Dotiki to test its emergency and rescue procedures.

September 1995: A miner is killed at Dotiki when the dozer he was driving toppled into a coal hopper.

December 1995: From 275 feet underground inside Dotiki, Kentucky Educational Television broadcasts an hour-long long, "Electronic Field Trip to a Coal Mine," that was seen by 12,000 schoolchildren at 301 schools across the state. KET said it was the first live broadcast from an underground coal mine, ever.

September 1996: With the coal market weak, Joseph Craft leads a buyout of Mapco's five coal mine complexes, forming Alliance Coal Corp.

1999: Alliance Resources Partners L.P., a publicly traded master limited partnership, is formed as the parent company of Alliance Coal. A variety of acquisitions and new mines follow.

June 1999: Dotiki's mine rescue team takes first place in the Western Kentucky Mining Institute's Safety Day team competition, beating 12 other teams from the region.

September 1999: While other western Kentucky mining operations withered from low prices for their high-sulfur coal, Alliance buys coal reserves adjacent to Dotiki that could yield 21 millions of saleable coal and extend its operating life. Dotiki had posted a 36-percent increase in productivity over the previous three years.

September 1999: Dotiki's mine rescue team takes fourth place in the 45-team 1999 National and International Mine Rescue, First Aid, EMT and Bench Contest held in Louisville.

May 2000: Dotiki's mine rescue team wins the Western Kentucky Mining Institute's third annual Safety Days Contest in Madisonville.

October 2000: Alliance reports that the coal market is improving, helped by surging oil and natural gas prices, which CEO Craft said "are solidifying coal's existing position as the most economic choice for low-cost electricity generation."

Dotiki adds a mining unit to boost production.

November 2001: Dotiki is honored as the safest underground mine in western Kentucky by the Kentucky Coal Association and Kentucky Department for Mines and Minerals.

December 2001: Alliance's share prices climb 50 percent for the year, boosted by climbing coal prices and record profits.

January 2003: As Dotiki's mining operations move southward, the mine constructs a new mine shaft near Nebo, Ky.

2003: Dotiki is the largest of Alliance's eight mining complexes, producing 4 million tons per year.

Feb. 11, 2004: An underground fire broke out in Dotiki near Nebo, sparked by a diesel-powered supply tractor. No injuries were reported, but miners reported intense heat that melted water lines as well as heavy, black smoke and dangerous gases. Mining was idled while the mine was sealed and capped.

March 8, 2004: Alliance reports that the fire had been extinguished by isolating the burning area, then drilling holes from the surface and pumping inert gases into that area. The mine was being ventilated with fresh air, allowing mining to resume. Alliance said its mine rescue teams and other employees had accomplished in 21 days what would have taken months using conventional methods. The majority of the mine's 360 miners were temporarily transferred to the company's other mines to boost production while Dotiki was idled.

March 25, 2004: The U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration commends Dotiki for its efforts and for immediately seeking the aid of state and federal mining officials. MSHA said the company-state-federal cooperation stood as a model for other mines to emulate, and the agency produced a 12-minute video highlighting the unprecedented team effort.

Meanwhile, Alliance announces a $7.7 million investment at Dotiki to increase its production capacity.

October 2004: Craft says that with power companies installing scrubbers to remove sulfur from their exhaust gases, demand for the region's high-sulfur coal could increase by 20 percent, or 50 million tons, over the next five years. Alliance secured more reserves in Hopkins County to help meet demand.

June 2007: Alliance Coal, now the nation's No. 4 coal producer, acquires rights to 78 million more tons of high-sulfur coal reserves in Webster and Hopkins counties, which it says will add 10 to 15 years to the lives of the Dotiki and Warrior mines. The reserves encompass 13,500 acres.

2008: Dotiki ranks as the nation's 45th largest coal producer and the 19th largest underground mine, producing nearly 4.7 million tons that year, according to the U.S. Energy Information Adminstration. It's the second-largest coal producer in Kentucky, behind Alliance's Warrior Mine in Hopkins County.

November 2009: The Courier-Journal newspaper in Louisville reports that Craft, other officials of Alliance and its political action committee had given at least $400,000 to Kentucky candidates and political committees since the beginning of 2005. Craft insists he gets no favors from the contributions.

December 2009: Ron Mills, Kentucky's director of mine permits, is fired. Mills had resisted granting five permits Alliance wanted covering 55,000 acres in Webster and Hopkins counties over a dispute as to whether the company had the legal right to enter all of the property. Gov. Steve Beshear's administration subsequently approves the permits.

Later, Mills tells The Lexington Herald-Leader that an Alliance official's email message indicated that the company knew he would be fired before Mills did, raising questions about how much clout the coal company has over its state regulators.

Wednesday, April 28, 2010: Two miners are killed when a section of mine roof collapses approximately 500 feet underground and 24,000 feet into the 367-employee Dotiki Mine.

January 2016: Dotiki Mine Complex featured on multi-media National Public Radio story called, "In Kentucky, The Coal Habit Is Hard To Break."

November 2016: As the presidential election loomed, ARLP was reporting an 8.6 percent profit increase during the third quarter of the year, thanks to an all-time quarterly record sales of 10.8 million tons, according to the Journal-Enterprise newspaper in Webster County. Still "rumors have been circulating among Dotiki employees that the mine was beginning the same reassignment process that marked the final months of ARLP’s Sebree Mine operation in 2015 ..."

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