The coal up there is in the middle of the range of maturity - sub-bituminous. Worst to best: peat/lignite/sub-bituminous/bituminous/anthracite. It will be really dirty/smudgy I would guess. But, as a backup it would probably suffice.

When I camped on the Homer Spit for a week, there were small boulders (3'x2'x1.5') of the stuff all over the beach. By the way, it rained for 4.5 days out of 5 that I was on the beach.