I remember reading an article that states that most of the gold in Alabama is bonded into the rock in such a way that recovering it was not economically feasible. Not that the ore is hard to mine, but separating it from the ore is very expensive requiring crazy amounts of electricity. I believe this kind of gold is mainly in the area around Clay, Randolph, Tallapoosa and Chambers counties that have lots of Mica and Quartz.
