In 1994, following the privatisation of the UK mining industry, it grew fivefold with the acquisition of British Coal's core activities.

In 2012, UK Coal were fined £200,000 after pleading guilty to breaching health and safety laws after a death of a miner at Kellingley Colliery.

[9] Another deep mine, Daw Mill at Furnace End, Warwickshire, closed in 2013 after an underground fire damaged much of the facilities.

On 10 April 2014, Reuters reported that the British government was to give UK Coal a £10 million loan to help fund the closure of its two remaining deep mines.

The three surface mines are Butterwell and Potland Burn in Northumberland and Park Wall North in County Durham.

UK Coal, through its Harworth Power subsidiary, engaged in mine gas recovery, to generate electricity.

[15] At the time of the sale, it operated 14 gas engines of 26 MW generation capacity supplying electricity to UK Coal and the National Grid.

Coalfield Resources initially retained the remainder of UK Coal Mine Holdings's economic and voting rights, but the shareholdings rank behind pension fund debt.

Harworth Estates manage, develop and regenerate their extensive portfolio of land totalling over 30,000 acres (12,000 ha).