Peripheral gully and landslide erosion on an extreme anthropogenic landscape produced by mountaintop removal coal mining

Abstract

AbstractMountaintop removal/valley fill coal mining (MTR/VF) in central Appalachia has buried an estimated 4000 km of headwater streams, but the long‐term geomorphic consequences of the anthropogenic valley fills and associated mined landscapes are poorly understood. These anthropogenic landscapes are not intended to be maintained in perpetuity once reclamation is complete. Here we present the first ever field‐based study of erosional landforms on this type of mined landscape paired with the subsequent examination of 10 regional LiDAR (light detection and ranging) datasets for gullies and landslides in a transect from eastern Kentucky to central West Virginia. Field observations indicate that overtopping of or intentional discharge from drainage systems and overtopping of valley fill terraces can initiate gullying. We manually extracted 1328 gullies from 512 km2 of mined landscape within the LiDAR datasets. Gullies are predominantly located along the perimeter of the mined landscape with the majority of gullies associated with drainage systems. The number of gullies linearly scales with mined area (R2 = 0.66). We observed 387 landslides along the perimeter of MTR/VF. Within the datasets, landslides per km2 ranged from 0.1 to 3.9. We observed 34 landslides within fully reclaimed valley fills, a heretofore undocumented phenomenon. Over 90% of these landslides were in Kentucky datasets, which covered only 47% of total mined area analyzed. Previously measured regional differences in the angle of friction of mine spoils or construction practices may explain the abundance of gullies and elevated level of landslide occurrence in eastern Kentucky valley fills relative to West Virginia. Observations of erosion on regionally extensive MTR/VF landscapes warrant further study to better ascertain ecological impacts. Large‐scale alteration by surface mining in steep landscapes may generally lead to peripheral gully erosion. © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.