Press Releases

Peabody Energy today announced that five director nominees were elected to its board of directors at the company's annual meeting of shareholders.

M. Frances Keeth, former Executive Vice President of Royal Dutch Shell, plc, and former Chief Executive Officer and President of Shell Chemicals Limited was elected to the board.

  Re-elected directors include:
  --  Gregory H. Boyce, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Peabody
      Energy;
  --  William E. James, founding partner of RockPort Capital Partners LLC;
  --  Robert B. Karn III, a former managing partner in financial and
      economic consulting with Arthur Andersen in St. Louis; and

  --  Henry E. Lentz, former Managing Director of Barclays Capital, who will
      be joining Lazard Freres & Co. as Managing Director in June 2009.

The board thanked Dr. Blanche M. Touhill, Chancellor Emeritus and Professor Emeritus at the University of Missouri - St. Louis, for her distinguished service upon her retirement from the board in accordance with the company's director retirement policy. She is a longstanding Chair of the company's Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee and provided valuable guidance to the board as the company introduced a host of governance best practices.

Peabody's shareholders also ratified the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for 2009 and reapproved the material terms of the performance measures under the company's 2004 Long-Term Equity Incentive Plan.

Peabody Energy is the world's largest private-sector coal company, with 2008 sales of 256 million tons and $6.6 billion in revenues. Its coal products fuel 10 percent of all U.S. electricity generation and 2 percent of worldwide electricity.

  CONTACT:
  Meg Gallagher
  314-342-7963

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SOURCE: Peabody Energy