A company pursuing an Eastern Montana coal mine might skip over a planned 300,000-ton test pit and move ahead with a full-scale mine if it can find a willing customer for the fuel, an executive said.

KANSAS CITY NATIONAL SECURITY CAMPUS, Mo. — In an ultra-sterile room at a secure factory in Kansas City, U.S. government technicians refurbish the nation's nuclear warheads. The job is exacting: Each ...