The station consumed up to 4,500,000 tonnes (4,400,000 long tons; 5,000,000 short tons) of coal each year.
Coal was delivered either by road or rail to the station's coal store, which had the capacity to hold up to 2,000,000 tonnes.
It was then fed from the coal store to the boiler house by a conveyor belt capable of carrying 3500 tonnes of coal per hour.

Each of the four boilers was serviced by eight pulverising units each capable of processing 40 tonnes of coal an hour.
The front-wall-fired Foster Wheeler boilers could each burn around 250 tonnes of coal an hour at full load.
There were two forced draft and two induced draft fans on each boiler.
Each boiler provided around 1800 tonnes per hour of steam at a pressure of 168 bars (16,800 kPa) and a temperature of 568 °C (1,054 °F) to two 300 MW General Electric Company turbo generators.
The thermal efficiency of the plant was around 37%.
The station consumed up to 4,500,000 tonnes (4,400,000 long tons; 5,000,000 short tons) of coal each year. Coal was delivered either by road or rail to the station's coal store, which had the capacity to hold up to 2,000,000 tonnes. It was then fed from the coal store to the boiler house by a conveyor belt capable of carrying 3500 tonnes of coal per hour.
Each of the four boilers was serviced by eight pulverising units each capable of processing 40 tonnes of coal an hour. The front-wall-fired Foster Wheeler boilers could each burn around 250 tonnes of coal an hour at full load. There were two forced draft and two induced draft fans on each boiler. Each boiler provided around 1800 tonnes per hour of steam at a pressure of 168 bars (16,800 kPa) and a temperature of 568 °C (1,054 °F) to two 300 MW General Electric Company turbo generators. The thermal efficiency of the plant was around 37%.
Longannet power station