Photo is looking north from the Bisti Trading Post, south of Farmington, New Mexico.Red areas are burned coal outcrops known as clinker.
The Coal Availability studies are funded by USGS-NMBGMR cooperative agreements to look at coal areas (on a quadrangle scale) that have potential for mining. These studies look at the original resource and then remove any mining, technological, environmental, or cultural restrictions to determine the available coal in an area. All of these calculations are done within a GIS.
The first Coal Availability study was in the Bisti area, southwest of Farmington, New Mexico looking at Fruitland Formation coal resources. This study was completed in 1998. The second study was done in the Standing Rock area, northwest of Grants, New Mexico looking at Cleary Coal Member, Menefee Formation coals. This study was completed in September 1999. A third study, completed in 2000, investigates the Upper Member Menefee Formation coals in the La Ventana area southwest of Cuba, New Mexico. Another availability study of the Fruitland Formation in the Fruitland and Navajo fields was completed and published as an open-file in 2001. The last availability study funded by the USGS looked at the Raton and Vermejo formations in the central Raton basin, northeast New Mexico.
Hoffman, G.K., and Jones, G.E., 1998, Availability of coal resources in the Fruitland Formation, San Juan Basin, northwest New Mexico: New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources Open-file report 438, 15 p.
Hoffman, G.K., and Jones, G. E., February 2001, Coal Availability Studies, Fruitland and Menefee Formations, San Juan Basin, New Mexico: in Transactions, Society of Mining, Metallurgy, and Exploration Annual Meeting, Salt Lake City, vol. 310. Abstract
Hoffman G.K., and Jones, G. E., 2001, Coal Availability Study- Upper Menefee Formation in the Chacra Mesa, La Ventana fields, Northwest New Mexico: New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources Open-file report 457, 16 p., 1 appendix.
Hoffman, G.K. and Jones, G.E., 2001 Coal Availability Study-Fruitland Formation in the Fruitland and Navajo Fields, Northwest New Mexico: New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources Open-file report 464, 33 p., 1 appendix.
Hoffman, G.K. and Jones, G.E., 2005, Availability of Coal Resources in the Vermejo and Raton formations, Raton coalfield, Raton Basin, northeast New Mexico, New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources, Open-file Report 490, 48 p. 2 appendices.