Western Plains

Coal is present in relatively horizontal seams in the prairies of central and southern Alberta and southern Saskatchewan. The seams, which may be several kilometres in both length and width, are usually uniform in thickness throughout. The readily accessible plains coal occurs near the surface, overlain by shallow layers of glacial till, soil or rock.

Foothills and mountain regions

The mountainous regions, which straddle the Alberta-British Columbia boundary, contain extensive coal reserves. The geological settings in the foothills and mountain regions are more diverse than those of the plains and seams up to 15 metres thick have been found. However, unlike the plains, the mountain and foothills seams are often more deeply buried, steeply inclined, and faulted.

Maritimes

The Sydney coalfield is Nova Scotia's most significant -- it contains eleven major seams from 1.0 to 4.5 metres in thickness. A unique characteristic of this field is that it occurs mostly under the ocean. Other coalfields in Nova Scotia include Springhill, Pictou, Roslin and Joggins-Chignecto.

The Minto coalfield, located in New Brunswick, has coal seams that range between 0.3 and 0.7 metres in thickness and cover about 400 square kilometres.

Ontario

The Onakawana coalfield is found in northern Ontario adjacent to the Canadian Shield. Although this deposit covers 39 square kilometres, it has not yet been developed due to the coal's high moisture content and low heating value.

Yukon and Northwest Territories

The Yukon and Northwest Territories are known to contain modest deposits of coal, for the most part these northern deposits remain unexplored and undeveloped.