Looking over several investor presentations from some of the senior gold producers I came across two interesting slides which both relate to the idea of peak global gold production. The first slide, from Newmont Mining, shows global gold mine supply at a key turning point with supply falling in 2015:

Gold_mine_supply_projections

This slide shows a roughly 20 million ounce drop in annual mine production between now and 2022 - to put this into context, 20 million ounces is approximately 4x the amount of gold the Russian Central Bank has purchased during 2014

 The next slide from Goldcorp is even more compelling, even though it shows peak production occurring in 2015:

GG_Peak_Gold

"Peak discovery" took place during the mid '90s and due to the lengthy mine development process only now is mine production peaking. Even at the peak of the resource boom (2006-2007) new gold discoveries were only about 1/2 of what they were in the mid '90s. 

The facts are that new, economic gold mines are extremely hard to come by. As we have witnessed during the past decade, the major gold producers have ventured into the depths of Africa, Russia, and even to the Arctic Circle only to end up burning through tens of billions of dollars in a futile effort to replace their gold reserves.

Of course if the gold price were to be double what it is today (~$1200/oz) there would be a great deal of low grade/high cost resources that would suddenly become economic. However, as evidenced by the slides above in a sub-$1500 gold price environment we are at peak gold.