Elkview Coal Mine

This article is part of the Global Coal Mine Tracker, a project of Global Energy Monitor.

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Elkview Coal Mine is an operating coal mine in Sparwood, East Kootenay, British Columbia, Canada.

Location

Table 1: Project-level location details

Mine Name	Location	Coordinates (WGS 84)
Elkview Coal Mine	Sparwood, British Columbia, Canada	49.742507, -114.823906 (exact)

The map below shows the exact location of the coal mine:

Project Details

Table 2: Project status

Status	Status Detail	Opening Year	Closing Year
Operating	–	1969	2057 (planned)

Table 3: Operation details

Note: The asterisk (*) signifies that the value is a GEM estimated figure.

Capacity (Mtpa)	Production (Mtpa)	Year of Production	Mine Type	Mining Method	Mine Size (km2)	Mine Depth (m)	Workforce Size
9	8	2024	Surface	Open Pit	271	60*	1350

Table 4: Coal resources and destination

Total Reserves (Mt)	Year of Total Reserves Recorded	Total Resources (Mt)	Coalfield	Coal Type	Coal Grade	Primary Consumer/ Destination
241	2023	628.2	–	Bituminous	Met	–

Table 5: Ownership and parent company

Note: To access more comprehensive data on energy ownership, please visit the Global Energy Ownership Tracker.

Owner	Parent Company	Headquarters
Elk Valley Resources [100.0%]	Glencore [77%]; Nippon Steel Corp [20%]; POSCO [3%]	Canada, Japan, South Korea

Table 6: Historical production (unit: million tonnes per annum)

ROM or Saleable	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
ROM	6.2	6.66	7.1	6.67	9	5.4	5.4	8	–

Reported Methane Emissions Data

Global Energy Monitor collates facility-scale methane emissions data reported by government and company sources collected in a systematic fashion. This mine is associated with the following methane emissions reports:

Table 7: Methane emissions

Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes CO2 equivalent)	Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes CH4)	Year of Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions	Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes) Reference	Reference type
9.723	807.009	2024	​	national government data

Note: The above sections were automatically generated and are based on data from the Global Coal Mine Tracker August 2026 release.

Reported Methane Emissions Data

Global Energy Monitor collates facility-scale methane emissions data reported by government and company sources collected in a systematic fashion. This mine is associated with the following methane emissions reports:

Table 7: Methane emissions

Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes CO2 equivalent)	Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes CH4)	Year of Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions	Reported Coal Mine Methane Emissions (thousand tonnes) Reference	Reference type
9.723	807.009	2024	​	national government data

Note: The above sections were automatically generated and are based on data from the Global Coal Mine Tracker May 2026 release.

Ownership Tree

This ownership tree is part of the Global Energy Ownership Tracker, a project of Global Energy Monitor.

Background

Elkview Mine is a surface coal mine, operated by Teck Coal near Sparwood, British Columbia, Canada. Teck has a 95% partnership interest in the Elkview mine. The remaining 5% is held equally by Nippon Steel Corporation and POSCO, a Korean steel producer, each of which acquired a 2.5% interest in 2005 for US$25 million. The mine is 27,054 hectares of coal lands of which 3,599 hectares have been mined or are scheduled for mining. Elkview is primarily steelmaking coal, and a small amount of thermal coal. The annual production capacities of the mine and preparation plan are approximately 5.6 million and 6.5 milllion tons. At 2010 production rates, the Elkview mine is estimated to have a remaining reserve life of approximately 41 years.

• Operator: Teck Coal
• Owner: Teck Coal (95%), Nippon Steel (2.5%), POSCO (2.5%)
• Location: Sparwood, British Columbia, Canada
• GPS Coordinates:49.742507, -114.823906 (exact)
• Mine Status: Operating
• Start Year:
• Production: 7.9 million tonnes
• Mineable Reserves:
• Coal Type: Met, bituminous
• Mine Size:
• Mine Type: Surface
• Number of Employees: 920

Environmental Impacts

According to the Environmental Justice (EJ) Atlas, over the past two decades, scientists and citizens have been alerting to the fact that populations of fish, invertebrates and other marine animals in the area have been decreasing while the remaining populations have been displaying increasing deformities.

These phenomena are due to the high presence of selenium in the waterways of the valley, a substance which is necessary to human health in small doses but becomes toxic in high doses, and which is detrimental and potentially lethal to other non-human animals including fish.

The selenium comes from the Elk Valley Mines, which extract metallurgical coal necessary for the manufacturing of steel by applying a “cross-valley fill” technique. The rock is first scraped from the surface of the mountainside after which the coal is separated from the rest of the material, which becomes waste. The waste material, which contains the selenium deposits, is left in piles and, through exposure to air and water, slowly seeps selenium into groundwater, eventually reaching river bodies.

Mine Expansion

In April 2020, Teck completed its Elkview Operations Plant Expansion Project. The expansion gave Elkview the capacity to produce nine million tonnes annually. It also allowed Teck to replace higher cost production from its Cardinal River operations (which closed in the second half of 2020) with lower cost production from its Elkview operations.

Proven and probable reserves at Elkview are now projected to support mining for a further 30 years, extending the life of the mine to 2047.

Project Expansion Details

• Status: Operating
• Capacity: 9 million tons per annum
• Mineable Reserves:
• Start Year: 2020
• Source of Financing:

Coal Mine Boundaries and Methane Sources

Global Energy Monitor researchers have identified coal mine boundary/boundaries and potential sources of coal mine methane (CMM) for this mine. These research results can be used to drive CMM attribution and mitigation efforts, particularly when combined with remotely sensed methane plume locations and mine ownership data. Explore the results with the embedded map at the top of this page by clicking on the mine boundary polygon or the CMM placemarkers to reveal more details. A detailed description of this research can be found in Coal Mine Boundaries and Methane Sources. This data is also available as a downloadable companion dataset to the Global Coal Mine Tracker and the Global Methane Emitters Tracker.

Table SMP1: Coal mine boundaries and methane sources data

ID	Mine feature category	Mine feature subcategory	Description	Coordinates precision	Data source date
M0140.B1	mine boundary	surface	Elkview Coal Mine permit boundary - part 1	extracted	2022-12-31 00:00:00
M0140.B2	mine boundary	surface	Elkview Coal Mine permit boundary - part 2	extracted	2022-12-31 00:00:00
M0140.B3	mine boundary	surface	Elkview Coal Mine permit boundary - part 3	extracted	2022-12-31 00:00:00
M0140.P1	other	preparation plant	Coal wash plant at Elkview Coal Mine	extracted	2024-09-27 00:00:00

Table SMP2: Coal mine boundaries and methane sources data (continued)

Coal mine boundaries and methane sources were last researched for this mine on Jul 23, 2025

ID	Notes
M0140.B1	The boundary is the Mines Act Permit Boundary found in Figure 4-1 on page 4-2 of "Technical Report on Elkview Coal Operation", https://web.archive.org/web/20250316235959/https://minedocs.com/24/Elkview_TR_12312022.pdf, December 31, 2022. The extracted boundary includes a simplified outer boundary only, and excludes smaller inner boundaries mainly located at the periphery of the polygon. The approximate bounday area is 59 sq km.
M0140.B2	The boundary is small northwest boundary from the Mines Act Permit Boundary found in Figure 4-1 on page 4-2 of "Technical Report on Elkview Coal Operation", https://web.archive.org/web/20250316235959/https://minedocs.com/24/Elkview_TR_12312022.pdf, December 31, 2022. The approximate boundary area is 0.3 sq km.
M0140.B3	The boundary is northeast boundary from the Mines Act Permit Boundary found in Figure 4-1 on page 4-2 of "Technical Report on Elkview Coal Operation", https://web.archive.org/web/20250316235959/https://minedocs.com/24/Elkview_TR_12312022.pdf, December 31, 2022. The approximate boundary area is 0.3 sq km.
M0140.P1	Location of Wash Plant extracted from Figure 10-1: Drill Collar Location Plan on page 10-5 of "Technical Report on Elkview Coal Operation", https://web.archive.org/web/20250316235959/https://minedocs.com/24/Elkview_TR_12312022.pdf, December 31, 2022, and confirmed visually in Google Earth Pro satellite imagery from 9/27/2024.

Methane Plumes Detected Nearby

Global Energy Monitor researchers analyze satellite-detected methane plumes in order to determine whether they have been observed at or near the site of GEM energy assets. The satellite data provider creates imagery of individual methane plumes and estimates their emission rates at the time of observation. GEM has reviewed many of these plume detections against Google Earth imagery and GEM’s own energy infrastructure tracker data. The following table lists methane plumes which are associated with the energy asset or facility based on distance and manual review. (A full description of the analysis process is available in the Global Methane Emitters Tracker methodology wiki page.)

Table M1: Plume details

For additional details on this individual plume identification and others, see the Global Methane Emitters Tracker.

Observation date	Satellite data provider	Location of plume origin	Methane emissions rate	Additional plume information
2022-09-02T19:12:24+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220902t191224-A	49.72554, -114.802	1047.377 kg/hr	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-02, 1
2022-09-03T19:30:07+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220903t193007-A	49.73927, -114.818	978.9764 kg/hr	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-03, 8
2022-09-06T19:57:51+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220906t195751-A	49.74407, -114.838	525.8099 kg/hr	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-06, 3
2022-09-06T20:02:50+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220906t200250-A	49.73843, -114.816	1299.924 kg/hr	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-06, 5
2022-09-06T20:22:30+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220906t202230-A	49.73914, -114.817	–	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-06, 6
2022-09-06T20:22:30+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220906t202230-B	49.75029, -114.795	–	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-06, 7
2022-09-06T20:27:47+00	CarbonMapper, ang20220906t202747-A	49.74415, -114.839	731.318 kg/hr	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2022-09-06, 4
2024-08-11T17:32:05+00	CarbonMapper, emi20240811t173205p12004-B	49.73986, -114.839	2487.707 kg/hr	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2024-08-11, 1
2025-01-25T19:03:50+00	CarbonMapper, tan20250125t190350c00s4001-A	49.73945, -114.815	–	British Columbia Province Methane Observation 2025-01-25, 1

Articles and Resources

Additional data

To access additional data, including an interactive map of world coal mines, a downloadable dataset, and summary data, please visit the Global Coal Mine Tracker on the Global Energy Monitor website.