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Jim Walter Resources (JWR) is the southernmost Appalachian coal producer. The company was formed in 1977 from the former Coke, Iron and Chemicals Division of U.S. Pipe & Foundry Company.
Its businesses consist of mining high quality coal from Alabama's Blue Creek seam and related methane gas operations. Since its inception, JWR has grown from a small, captive producer of less than 1 million tons of coal per year, produced solely for use in its sister company's coke ovens, into one of the 25 largest coal producers in the United States, with 6.3 million tons of coal sold in 2008.
 JWR's two deep-shaft underground mines — Mines No. 4 and No. 7 — use the standard "continuous mining" method for development and advanced "longwall" mining technology for primary production. In contrast to surface mining or typical underground mines located 200 to 500 feet below the surface, JWR's mines are 1,500 to 2,200 feet underground, making them the deepest vertical shaft coal mines in North America.
Blue Creek Coal is synonymous with quality in markets worldwide. Its general characteristics — very low sulfur, strong coking properties, high heat value — make it ideally suited to the requirements of steel makers as a coking coal and to utilities as a steam coal. These qualities enable JWR to successfully market steam coal domestically and metallurgical coal to the worldwide export market.
The growth and success of Jim Walter Resources' coal mining operations have continued to fuel the success of the company's coal seam degasification business, Black Warrior Methane. Black Warrior Methane was formed in 1981 to recover and market methane gas principally from the Blue Creek Coal seam on lands owned or leased by the company.
The original motivation for the business was to reduce, in advance of mining, the level of methane concentrations in and around the mining operations and to augment productivity by decreasing the amount of gas to be ventilated from the mines. Today, it represents one of the most extensive and comprehensive commercial programs for coal seam degasification in the United States, producing nearly 21.6 million cubic feet of gas daily from its 400-plus wells.
Production is obtained from three types of wells: "gob" wells, which are drilled just above the coal seams and begin producing gas from the gob, or loose strata, created after a longwall mining unit passes under the well bore; vertical vent/horizontal wells, a vertical vent hole from the surface to the underground area, connecting a series of horizontally driven bores into a coal seam; and standard conventional wells drilled directly into the coal seam.
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