Cortez Gold Mine is a large gold mining and processing facility in Lander and Eureka County, Nevada, United States, located approximately 75 miles (120 km) southwest of Elko. It is owned as a joint venture between Barrick Gold Corporation (61.5%) and Newmont Corporation (38.5%), operated by Barrick, and comprises the Pipeline, Crossroads, and Cortez Hills open-pit mines; and the Cortez Hills underground mine.
The Cortez Mountains has been mined since 1862, with silver being the primary commodity until the 1940s. The Gold Acres operation in the Cortez Mountains included open pit and underground mines in the 1930s and 1940s. Cortez Gold opened in 1968 and production ended in 1976. The United States Bureau of Mines built a pilot plant in 1969 which would make heap leaching for gold commercially viable by 1971. The low-grade ore and dump material from the Gold Acres operation was then heap leached.
The Cortez mill was reopened as the price of gold increased in the early 1980s, feed for the mill was provided by the nearby Horse Canyon deposit between 1983 and 1987. Further exploration of the region was carried out by Cortez Joint Venture which involved Placer Dome and Kenecott (at the time Kenecott was a BP Minerals subsidiary). The result of the joint venture’s exploration was the 1991 discovery of the Pipeline orebody. The Pipeline orebody was located near the Gold Acres operation, instead of being located in the foothills, it was entirely within the Crescent Valley. The entire Pipeline complex contained 23 million ounces of gold at that time.
According to nsenergybusiness.com; en.wikipedia. Source of photo: internet
