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The process of gold mining dates back to the Roman Period and since then, there have been many methods by which it is done. Each technique follows a very intricate process and different mining companies around the world settle for the method that they believe will be most beneficial to their business. Here are some of those methods:
a. Placer Mining
• Gold Panning – this is the method of manually sorting gold out using a shallow pan. This is effective because gold tends to settle beneath everything else.
• Metal Detecting – this is done, of course, with the help of a metal detector; and you basically need to walk around and have the detector scan all surfaces for traces of metal that could be gold.
• Sluicing – makes use of a man-made sluice box
• Dredging – Dredges are basically small machines that float on water and are operated by two people
b. Hard Rock Mining – If gold is not found in loose sediment, and instead is embedded in a rock, then you collect gold by hard rock mining.
c. By-product Gold Mining – This is the process of producing gold only as a by-product and not really the main product being collected just like in copper mines.
Mining is not an easy job. Apart from it having to follow a truly rigorous process, mining is also very dangerous. In fact through the years, the world has seen many diseases and injuries connected to this ancient occupation.
a. Physical Hazards – mining has given way to a number of traumatic injuries, some even fatal. These could be caused by the following: rock fall, fires, explosions, equipment accidents, falls from heights and electrocution.
b. Chemical Hazards – exposure to hydrogen cyanide gas can be truly hazardous. It can be deadly in increased levels. More so, the release of arsenic and other poisonous chemicals that tend to go along with cyanide poisoning is very dangerous.
c. Biological Hazards – miners can acquire many tropical diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, loptospirosis and ankylstomiasis.
d. Ergonomic Hazards – fatigue
e. Psychosocial Hazards – drug and alcohol abuse is common to miners
Being aware of these hazards can prevent accidents from happening. Gold mining stocks are an excellent way to earn lots of money- it could give anyone unlimited wealth. But you need to always ensure everyone’s safety to avoid any problems from taking place.
When you decide to invest in gold mining stocks, make sure you do your due diligence on the record of the company. You not only need to look at the expected returns but also at the management and safety record of the company. One big accident could see your stock values plummet so you need to make sure that the company has an excellent track record.

The main type of gold extraction today is hard rock mining using either open pit methods or sub-surface mines. Mining gold from water was a method that was widely used during the California gold rush but is not commercially viable today and is used mainly by artisan gold miners.

Gold Mining: Panning

The original method of mining gold from water was known as panning and is a manual technique to sort gold from gravel and sediments present in a stream. The pan is filled with material from the stream bed and then submerged underwater and shaken. As gold is much denser it falls to the bottom of the pan.

Gold panning is probably the easiest technique to find gold but again it is not commercially viable for large scale production. It is sometimes used as a method to identify placer deposits of gold which can later be evaluated for their commercial value.

Gold Mining: Sluicing

Another method that is still used to day of mining gold from water is sluicing. The technique uses a sluice box, a channel with riffles set in the bottom, where the material is placed at the top and water carries it to the bottom with the gold dropping out of the water due to its density.

Larger scale mining operations also use screening plants to remove larger debris and boulders before the resulting material is moved to a sluice box. These types of operations involve much more gold mining equipment such as excavators, rock trucks, loaders and many more to remove the material from the stream or river and transport it to the different stations where the gold is separated out.

Dredging

Dredging is mainly used by small scale operations and usually suction dredges are used rather than the classic bucket and line method. The former is much more efficient and different size hoses can be used to target difficult to reach areas such as behind large boulders. Essentially a floating processing unit sucks up the material from the river bed in a temporary pond, processes it on board and expels the water and unwanted gravel or sediment back into the pond.

This is a very cost-efficient method of mining gold from water and also has a low environmental impact because no vegetation needs to be stripped and all the water is recycled. The operation is also seasonal as permits are issued only for periods that do not conflict with the spawning season of fish.

In terms of efficiency and commercial viability for large scale mining operations, hard rock mining is still the preferred gold extraction method.

If you have a desire to take up gold mining on a small scale then your best option would be to start with panning as the investment in gold mining supplies is minimal versus other methods of mining gold from water. Once you get a feel for gold mining you can graduate to more complicated methods if you have the necessary investment. Of course you could also consider starting a junior exploration company of your own with backers to become the next big gold producer.

Producing pure gold results in a very high environmental burden due to the physical mining and extraction processes used to extract the pure metal. Whether gold is obtained from base ore which requires a mining operation (and tons of gold ore are required to produce one gram of pure gold) or by extracting gold metal from rivers and streams, the environmental impact is simply enormous.

The total output of gold from mining and extraction activities is actually not required if we consider the amount of pure gold which already exists and is available in our homes. Unused jewelry does very little in terms of producing an active investment return to the owners while at the same time, it represents a huge, untapped store of highly pure metal which does not require much to return it to a highly refined and usable state.

Green gold is recycled metal and because it does not need a great deal of handling and processing the environmental impact on producing pure, usable gold from existing sources is much less compared to gold which must be mined and extracted from ore.

Obtaining gold from ore requires large amounts of water, typically provided by rivers and dams, which in turn becomes very heavily polluted with by-products and the waste materials necessary to process the ore. Zinc for instance is necessary in order to bind the gold from the ore; zinc is highly toxic in concentrated form and it is an accumulative poison in similar ways as lead is.

To remove the zinc requires further poisonous and toxic processes, usually involving sulfuric acid to separate the zinc from the gold. Sulfuric acid itself is the active component of “acid rain” and is highly corrosive as well as damaging to plants, animals and people.

Even more deadly is the sodium cyanide which is used in conjunction with the zinc to create a “sludge” which contains the pure metal. In 2000, a dam burst in Romania and with the tens of thousands of tons of highly contaminated water, at least 100 tons of highly poisonous sodium cyanide were also released into the East European river system. The environmental carnage which resulted is still being cleaned up today and tens of thousands of fish and animals have died as a direct consequence.

Using gold which is effectively stockpiled in our homes makes commercial and environmental sense. In the current economic climate, gold is hitting all time high price levels because it is viewed by institutional investors as a safe haven for their clients. The reduced costs associated with producing refined gold ingots from existing gold in the form of jewelry and gold-bearing components such as computers also allows for high prices to be offered to those considering selling their jewelry.

Green gold is not only environmentally friendly but commercially an astute selling decision. High gold prices are fueling the prices gold recycling refiners can offer; however, once the economic climate recovers we can expect the price of pure gold to start dropping which in turn will lead to lower prices being offered to sellers.