Patriot Coal Corp. won confirmation of its chapter 11 debt repayment plan, clearing the way for the company to hand over its mines to new owners in an effort to preserve the business amid widespread distress in the coal industry, The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday. Bankruptcy Judge Keith Phillips said that he would approve Patriot’s chapter 11 plan as a “largely consensual plan and the result of extensive, comprehensive negotiations.” The plan proposes to sell Patriot’s mines to Blackhawk Mining LLC and a unit of nonprofit Virginia Conservation Legacy Fund, which are not offering cash for the assets but instead would issue new debt or take responsibility for existing Patriot debts. The company has eight mining complexes, all in West Virginia. An attorney for Patriot said that the plan is the “embodiment of thousands of hours of work” to achieve the best possible outcome for creditors as well as Patriot’s miners and other employees. The company faced a raft of creditor objections to the plan, but was able to resolve many of them before it presented the plan for court approval at a hearing that began Wednesday and continued into Thursday.
