Officials confirmed the closure of Fola’s Little Eagle operation near Bickmore, resulting in the laying off of 131 surface and office workers and 16 employees of the Little Eagle deep mine.

Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act letters outlining the furloughs will be sent out over 14 days from February 14. This will give the company an opportunity to complete coal processing and ship final coal from its preparation plant as well as recover the deep mine’s equipment and infrastructure.

“CONSOL Energy anticipates that accelerated reclamation work will continue through mid-summer,” officials said, noting that coal produced from the initial announcement in July to last week was only from the surface and was incidental to reclamation.

“A combination of market conditions and increasing pressure from the Environmental Protection Agency, which resulted in both increased costs of surface mining and significant uncertainty for the company's power generation customers related to the continued use of central Appalachian coal were cited as reasons for the idling,” the company added.

Company president Nicholas DeIuliis said he hoped coal markets would normalize in the second half of 2013 so it could review Fola’s status.

“The decision to idle our Fola operations is a difficult one, but earlier this year we began the effort to manage our inventory and to balance coal production with expected utility demand and shipping schedules," he said.

“Unfortunately, the domestic market for coal remains soft due to weak economic growth and activity and the continued inability of our customers to accept committed coal shipments remains a concern."