Trace Elements in West Virginia Coals

Erbium (Er) Summary Statistics

The histogram of erbium abundances in all West Virginia coal beds shows a slightly skewed distribution with a mean of 1.09 ppm (± 0.64 ppm) on a whole coal basis. The maximum Er content was 4.65 ppm in a bench of the Coalburg coal. Erbium did not correlate with ash yield, but correlated well with other rare earth elements in the mineral monazite such as dysprosium (Dy), yttrium (Y), gadolinium (Gd), neodymium (Nd), europium (Eu) and also ytterbium (Yb) and thorium (Th), and with several ash related elements such as vanadium (V), scandium (Sc), gallium (Ga), zirconium (Zr) and chromium (Cr).

**Spearman Correlation Coefficients (r) with Erbium**
Ash Yield	Dy	Y	Gd	V	Nd	Sc
+0.5367	+0.8171	+0.8115	+0.7630	+0.7619	+0.7516	+0.7328
n = 208	n = 68	n = 208	n = 157	n = 207	n = 156	n = 208
Yb	Ga	Zr	Eu	Cr	Th	Nb
+0.6907	+0.6823	+0.6697	+0.6595	+0.6476	+0.6144	+0.6141
n = 206	n = 208	n = 208	n = 207	n = 207	n = 196	n = 203

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Page last revised: March 2, 2002

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