ALASKA'S MAJOR MINES.

• Author: SCHMITZ, RICHARD F.

The production value of all mining in the state has topped $1 billion.

Rich in minerals. Those words have been used--in one form or an other--by miners, tour guides and development-minded officials to glowingly describe Alaska. Still, for many different reasons, only four major mines--defined as those with 100 or more employees--are actually producing ore, jobs and revenue in Alaska 134 years after Seward's Folly first became a household phrase.

Alaska will no doubt continue to be described as "rich in minerals." But a number of barriers will have to be breached before the state sees any large-scale increase in mining activity. For starters, stagnant gold prices are holding that sector to a low simmer. Then there's Alaska's basic lack of transportation infrastructure. And steady pressure and sophisticated tactics employed by the environmental movement in opposition to new mining development is a major factor that can't be ignored.

It's not all bad news, however.

Major Mining Developments Expand

Alaska's four major mines-Red Dog, Usibelli, Greens Creek and Fort Knox-are doing well enough. In fact, according to Steve Borell of the Alaska Miners Association, the only major new projects actually underway are associated directly with those mines. Greens Creek (producing silver, lead, zinc and gold on Admiralty Island in Southeast Alaska) and Red Dog (a major zinc mine in the Northwest Arctic) are expanding production through improvements in their processing facilities. Fort Knox (a gold mine close to Fairbanks) is developing some off-site properties as satellite pits while the Usibelli Coal Mine (at Healy) is in the process of developing a new area at the mine.

Greens Creek, already one of the nation's top silver producers, is tapping new ore reserves as well.

According to early figures from the state Department of Natural Resources for 1999, the production value of all mining topped $1 billion for the first time since 1981 at approximately $1.03 billion, up from $920.2 million in 1998. Development expenditures, however, were a paltry $26 million-the fourth worst year since '81. Exploration figures were a little better: $48 million-better than 14 of the past 18 years.

Two mines shut down: the Nixon Fork gold mine near McGrath, and the Illinois Creek gold mine near Galena.

"There certainly is great potential (for mining in Alaska)," said Dick Swainbank, development specialist with the state Department of Community and Economic Development...