ST. LOUIS, Oct 20, 2010 -- Arch Coal, Inc. (NYSE: ACI) today announced that it received a 2010 Innovation & Excellence in Asset Management Award from Mincom.

Arch Coal earned the "Lead the Way" award for the successful standardization of enterprise asset management systems at its nationwide mining operations. Arch Coal further plans to boost its return on assets and workforce performance by integrating the best-in-breed excellence in asset management functionality of Mincom Ellipse 8 with its back-office enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.

"Arch Coal is proud to be recognized for our maintenance and technology leadership," said David Hartley, Arch's vice president and chief information officer. "Our recognized excellence in asset management is linked to a commitment throughout Arch to constantly improve on key aspects of our business."

Also accepting the award was Arch's Vice President of Operations Services Neil Novak. "This award is a reflection of the collective efforts of all of our maintenance and operations employees to incorporate a reliability-centered maintenance approach that delivers significant cost and productivity improvements," said Novak.

To determine the four recipients of the 2010 Innovation & Excellence in Asset Management Awards, Mincom invited individuals, groups and businesses in the mining, public infrastructure, transit and the utility sectors to submit nominations for consideration. Winning submissions were chosen based on the development, delivery and deployment of best-in-class business practices and solution implementations.

Mincom Pty Ltd (http://www.mincom.com/) is a global software and services provider with nearly 30 years of experience in providing business solutions to companies in asset-intensive industries - such as mining, defense, energy and public infrastructure - in more than 40 countries around the world.

St. Louis-based Arch Coal is the second largest U.S. coal producer. Through its national network of mines, Arch supplies cleaner-burning, low-sulfur coal to fuel roughly 8 percent of the nation's electricity. The company also ships coal to domestic and international steel manufacturers as well as international power producers.