The human race has long had a love affair with coal. Coal is a fossil fuel that started forming in the Carboniferous Period 359 million to 299 million years ago during the Paleozoic Era. Stone and Bronze Age flint axes have been found embedded in coal, evidence that people were using it for fuel long before the Roman invasion. In the 13th century, coal seams were found along shorelines of northern England, and settlers dug them up then followed them inland under cliffs or hills, the earliest beginnings of drift mining. But with the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, coal mining exploded, providing fuel for steam engines, transportation, and…