Coal mining companies from Appalachia to Missouri are seeing plenty of rebounding demand, just not here at home.

Fresh from reporting third-quarter earnings, coal producers say booming Asian economies are increasingly hungry for energy even as the hardest-hit mining regions in the U.S. see little prospect for a comeback in coming months.

Big coal producers such as St. Louis-based Peabody Energy and Arch Coal say the rising demand for metallurgical coal, a key ingredient in steelmaking, is largely a foreign phenomenon.

On Tuesday, the top U.S. producer of metallurgical coal, Alpha Natural Resources, said it's planning to up production 1 million tons next year to take advantage and CEO Kevin Crutchfield said orders are starting to come in from Eastern and Western Europe.

America, on the other hand, remains in the doldrums.

"Nobody is seeing any effect of the stimulus in the U.S.," said steel industry analyst Charles Bradford of Affiliated Research Group. "There is recovery in world steel output."

That's not much help for domestic mines or U.S. mine workers. Metallurgical coal commands premium prices, but accounts for a relative sliver of U.S. production. The bulk of U.S. coal goes to electric power plants and they're not interested in buying these days.

There have been massive piles of unused coal outside of U.S. plants, a symptom of a country that is in a deep industrial funk.

As of August, electric plant stockpiles were up nearly 40 percent from the previous year, according to U.S. Department of Energy.

The recession, a very cool summer and cheap natural gas has slashed the amount of coal that power can use.

Producers have now idled enough U.S. mines to trim approximately 100 million tons of coal_ roughly 9 percent _ from production this year. Hundreds of miners in West Virginia, Kentucky and other key coal states have lost their jobs.

The cuts are continuing. Continued...