The long black streaks in the hills along Highway 40 outside Grande Cache, Alta., are a clear sign of the rich coal seams that run through the eastern slopes of the Rockies there.
The community, about 430 kilometres northwest of Edmonton, was established in the 1960s to serve the mine that still pulls coal out of the ground outside town. The volatile coal industry has fuelled the local economy from the beginning.
In recent years as coal fired power plants were phased out across Alberta, the future of the town’s existing mine became more uncertain. The local power plant was converted from
