Gold mining in Alaska, a state of the United States, has been a major industry and impetus for exploration and settlement since a few years after the United States acquired the territory in 1867 from the Russian Empire. Russian explorers discovered placer gold in the Kenai River in 1848, but no gold was produced. Gold mining started in 1870 from placers southeast of Juneau, Alaska.
Gold occurs and has been mined throughout Alaska; except in the vast swamps of the Yukon Flats, and along the North Slope between the Brooks Range and the Beaufort Sea. Areas near Fairbanks and Juneau, and Nome have produced most of Alaska's historical output and provide all current gold production . Nearly all of the large and many of the small placer-gold mines currently operating in the US are in Alaska. Seven modern large-scale hard-rock mines operated in Alaska ; five were gold-producing mines. There are also small-scale hard-rock gold-mining operations. In 2019 Alaska produced 539,390 troy ounces, 8.4% of the total national production, second only to Nevada (76%). This total was in steady decline from a peak of 1,022,987 ounces in 2013, which had been the highest since 1906. 2019 production was from five major mines: Fort Knox, Pogo, Kensington, Greens Creek and Dawson.
For 2018, gold worth $888,302,130 accounted for 28% of the mining wealth produced in Alaska. In comparison, zinc and lead mainly from the Red Dog mine, accounted for 66%; silver, mainly from the Greens Creek mine, accounted for 6.6%; and coal accounted for 1.1%. Alaska produced a total of 49.27 million troy ounces of gold from 1880 through the end of 2018.
Active mines
The following are active gold-producing mines and advanced lode exploration or development projects. 200,263
Lode (hard rock) mines
The Fort Knox mine is located within the Fairbanks North Star Borough, northeast of Fairbanks. The mine site is located primarily on State of Alaska and the Mental Health Trust lands. The mine is wholly owned by Kinross Gold Corporation. The mine opened in 1996 and in 2019 produced of gold. Fort Knox is an open-pit operation using carbon-in-pulp, heap leach, and gravity processes to recover gold. At the end of 2015 there were reserves of 162.4 million tons at 0.012 ounce of gold per ton (0.37 g/t), sufficient to carry the mine plan into year 2020, within a total identified resource of 284.4 million tons at 0.013 ounce per ton (0.40 g/t), containing of gold. Total 2015 employment at Fort Knox was 657 full-time-equivalent positions. The underground Pogo gold mine is owned and operated by Northern Star Resources, on State of Alaska-owned land northeast of Delta Junction in the Goodpaster district. In 2019 it produced of gold from stacked, shallow-dipping quartz veins up to . Pogo had 640 employees on site in 2018. The underground Kensington gold mine, owned by Coeur Mining, is located 45 air miles north of Juneau and south of Haines, located in the Berners Bay mining district. Access to the mine is by air or sea. The ore deposit consists of multiple mesothermal quartz, carbonate, and pyrite vein swarms and discrete quartz–pyrite veins hosted in Cretaceous diorite. Ore is processed in a flotation mill that produces a gold-bearing concentrate. In 2019 of gold were produced from 21,829 tons of concentrate that were shipped to an off-site refinery. The December 2015 Proven and Probable Reserve was 2.8 million tons of ore at 0.198 ounces of gold per ton (6.16 g/t) with of contained gold out of a total identified resource, inclusive of the Proven and Probable Reserve, of 6.7 million tons at 0.263 ounces of gold per ton (8.18 g/t). There were 332 full-time-equivalent employees at Kensington at the end of 2015. The Greens Creek mine is a silver-lead-zinc-gold mine owned and operated by Hecla Mining, located on private and federal land in the Admiralty mining district, southwest of Juneau. The Greens Creek deposit is a polymetallic, stratiform, volcanogenic massive-sulfide deposit that opened in 1989. In 2019, Greens Creek produced of gold. The mine also produced of silver, 51,532 tonnes of zinc and 18,245 tonnes of lead. As of December 31, 2019 Hecla reported a proven and probable reserve of 10.72 million tons of ore at 12.2 ounces of silver per ton, 2.80 g/t (0.09 oz/t) of gold, 2.8 percent lead, and 7.3 percent zinc. The estimated measured and indicated mineral resource was 8.645 million tons at 11.7 ounces of silver per ton, 0.1 ounce of gold per ton, 2.8 percent lead, and 8.1 percent zinc. In 2017 there were 414 local direct full-time-equivalent employees, part of a total of 975 direct, indirect, and induced employees.