steam coal steam coal has long played an essential role in satisfying the electrical energy needs of the united states growing long term demands for all forms of energy coupled with diminishing supplies and in creased costs for alternative fuels should bring coal into a position of even greater prominence in the years ahead utah's most substantial interest in steam coal is represented by its reserves and op erations located on the navajo indian res ervation in the four corners area of new mexico and held under a lease from the navajo tribe the term of the lease con tinues as long as the substances are pro duced from the leasehold in paying quan tities utah's navajo mine is one of the largest coal mines in terms of production in the united states utah sells its entire navajo mine pro duction under fuel supply agreements to fuel the four corners power plant which is owned by a group of six utilities and has a capacity of 2,085,000 kilowatts during 1976 the plant experienced continued mechanical problems and deliveries were up to only 6.5 million tons a modest im provement over the 6.2 million shipped in 1975 of utah's 1.1 billion tons of coal re serves recoverable by surface mining methods at navajo less than one-third are committed to the four corners power plant substantial amounts of the remaining reserves have been committed condition ally to supply coal to two utility companies for substitute natural gas plants which will convert the coal into pipeline quality gas for such a project to go forward it will be necessary for the utilities to obtain final approval of the federal power commis sion execution of a plant site lease receipt of government permits required for the construction of the plant and satisfactory financing guarantees eight miles north of the navajo mine utah operates the san juan mine as a con tractor for western coal company deliv eries during 1976 to the san juan power plant equaled the 1 2 million tons shipped during 1975 utah has given western coal company a conditional option to purchase coal from the navajo mine as required to fuel a portion of the requirements of ad ditional proposed generating units considerable progress was made dur ing 1976 towards the development of steam coal reserves located near craig colorado a mine office and equipment shop were among the facilities completed during the year good progress was made on the erection of a dragline which is scheduled to begin removal of overburden in april coal extraction is expected to be gin the following month and the first coal shipments to a nearby generating plant are scheduled for late 1977 litigation initiated in 1975 by utah to ascertain utah's delivery requirements from the craig mine was concluded satis factorily the judgment of the court limited the amount of coal utah is obligated to de liver to the owners of the power plant this amount is well within the mine's planned capacity of an average 2.1 million tons per year at utah's navajo mine a front-end loader with a 23.5-cubic yard bucket capacity loads stockpiled coal into one of the mine's railroad cars then the coal is hauled up to nine miles to centralized crushing and blending facilities where it is stacked i ¦ 30,000-ton blending piles prior to deliver to the four corners power plant