Crucitas revival in Costa Rica: policy, royalties and ESG risks for mine planners
Reviewed by Joe Ashwell
First reported on MINING.com
30 Second Briefing
Costa Rica’s President Laura Fernández is pushing Bill 24.717 to reopen the Crucitas gold deposit by allowing metallic mining only within the 84,800-hectare Cutris de San Carlos district, while keeping the national open-pit metal mining ban elsewhere. The bill proposes public auctions run by the Directorate of Geology and Mines, minimum 5% gross-sales royalties and strict technical, financial and environmental pre-qualification, aiming to displace mercury- and cyanide-based illegal mining. Analysts warn that investor interest will hinge less on Crucitas’ mid-sized geology and more on territorial control, gold traceability and long-term ESG and legal stability.
Technical Brief
- Earlier Crucitas economic studies assumed gold prices of US$1,000–1,300/oz versus ~US$4,000/oz today.
- Infinito Gold’s original open-pit concession was annulled by Costa Rica’s courts in 2010.
- International arbitration concluded in 2021 with no damages awarded to Infinito, removing a major contingent liability.
- Infinito dropped its attempt to annul the arbitration ruling in 2024, further clarifying legal closure.
- Bill 24.717 has passed committee stage, including endorsement by the Special Committee of Alajuela in September 2025.
- Opposition parties have lodged hundreds of procedural motions in the legislative plenary to delay a final vote.
- Fernández has publicly floated a national referendum as a contingency route if the Assembly blocks the bill.
- Analysts describe Crucitas as a mid-sized deposit, below the scale of major Andean gold projects.
Our Take
Costa Rica’s move to revisit the Crucitas gold deposit sits in contrast to Venezuela’s April mining law overhaul covered in our database, signalling that Latin American gold jurisdictions are diverging sharply between liberalisation and environmental restriction rather than converging on a single model.
With a minimum 5% royalty on gross mineral sales and over 70% of revenues earmarked for the central government, the proposed framework around Crucitas would place Costa Rica at the higher end of state take among the Latin American gold and copper policies tracked in our Policy corpus, which may limit interest from mid-tier developers even if the ban is eased.
GEM Mining Consulting appears repeatedly in our recent coverage, from Arctic copper and gold logistics to district-scale value indices, suggesting that its involvement in commentary around Costa Rica will likely frame Crucitas not just as a standalone gold asset but as a test case for how smaller jurisdictions treat copper and other critical minerals under sustainability-driven regimes.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
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