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An aerial view of Montgomery, W.Va., a community on the Kanawha River. Students stayed in Montgomery for three nights. The small city has a strong history both of fossil fuel extraction and cleaning up environmental damage from coal mining. (Photo by Chris Johnson)

Doug Fala, the vice president of Kanawha Valley operations at Blackhawk Mining LLC, shows Constance Legrand ’25 and Luc Cote ’23 some coal at Blackhawk’s Maple Eagle complex. Students on the trip came face-to-face with the disruption of coal mining and also heard from the company about the importance of coal mining jobs in West Virginia, as well as its efforts at environmental reclamation. (Photo by Chris Johnson)

Ashley Laveriano ’24, Hamza Najam ’26, and Angus McReynolds take a closer look at some coal at the Maple Eagle complex, operated by Blackhawk Mining. McReynolds is the experiential learning coordinator at ´óÏ㽶ÊÓƵ’s Arthur L. Irving Institute for Energy and Society and helped lead the trip. (Photo by Chris Johnson)

Joanne Liu ’23 surveys the surface mining operation at the Maple Eagle complex operated by Blackhawk Mining. (Photo by Chris Johnson)

An aerial view of the Mammoth Coal processing plant along the Kanawha River, an important artery for the industry. (Photo by Chris Johnson)

Mike King, the co-founder of the Morris Creek Watershed Association who served as a key community partner on the ´óÏ㽶ÊÓƵ trip, points out the Mammoth Coal processing plant, a major source of energy and jobs in the region. (Photo by Chris Johnson)