How Was Coal Formed?
Scientists believe that during the Carboniferous period (280 to 345 million years ago) large amounts of plant life and other organic matter grew in the swampy areas and lagoons that covered much of the earth. As the plants and other life forms died, they drifted down to the bottom of the swamps, slowly decomposed, and formed peat a soggy, spongelike material. The peat became buried and compressed under the earth’s surfaces over a long period of time. Over millions of years and through the forces of heat and pressure, the compressed peat became coal. The greater the heat and pressure, the harder the coal was that formed.
Coal was formed from the remains of ancient, strange looking trees, giant ferns, soft mosses, and grassy plants, all of which grew in swampy jungles hundreds of millions of years ago. When these giant trees and plants died and fell into the swamp, they rotted and became mixed with other decaying plants, forming a spongy brown ma
