Asteroid Mining

[Noncommunist]

Apparently, a US company lead by James Cameron and Google's top executives is now planning to mine some asteroids. Huge amounts of minerals can be found within the asteroids, some can even contain amounts of certain elements equivalent to all that we've ever mined on Earth. So this could dramatically change life if it works and some materials become extremely abundant. However, this will still be extremely difficult.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp...3f66f6244b.411

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...967904210.html

Any thoughts about it?

[Whacker]

No joke, my first thought was about those newspaper bits in Deus Ex that talk about the millions of casualties from the lunar miner orbiter crash.

[a completely inoffensive name]

It's more or less a pipe dream. This venture will cost in the tens of billions before they even start mining and the return from the investment might not be worth the cost depending on what they are mining. The biggest benefit will be the milestone for humanity in general to accomplish this and the ability to streamline the process to make it more affordable for future investors. I still say it should be done, but I don't think anyone should fool themselves into thinking that scarcity for certain resources is going to decrease anytime over the next few decades.


Oh, also they will need to develop a reusable ship like the space shuttle that can go back and forth from the asteroid to actually deliver the material to earth, unless they plan on putting it in a box and just shoving it towards earth.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Much more interesting than a moon base or sending someone to mars.

[HopAlongBunny]

Just listened to a CBC bit about it. Apparently no one doubts it is possible to do; the economics will certainly suck for the foreseeable future.

Fortunately, the investors seem more interested in demonstrating what is possible rather than making money. As the interview pointed out, rare earths are rare here, and often associated with areas thought to be "impact sites". If you can go to the source instead of waiting for it to land, rare earths become much less rare.

One thing they didn't mention is that the whole process could probably be best handled by robots.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Besides, didn't China buy up all the rare earth metals or something?

[a completely inoffensive name]

As the interview pointed out, rare earths are rare here, and often associated with areas thought to be "impact sites". If you can go to the source instead of waiting for it to land, rare earths become much less rare.

Actually rare earth's are not that rare. That's a misconception people have. The reason rare earth's seem rare is because the only country currently mining rare earth elements is china who is exercising their monopoly on the stuff to their benefit. According to the sources on the wikipedia page I am looking at, cerium has roughly the same abundance as copper.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Besides, didn't China buy up all the rare earth metals or something?

See my previous post.

[CBR]

Besides, didn't China buy up all the rare earth metals or something?

Dump the asteroids on China and make the metals less rare?

[rvg]

Asteroid mining should really pick up if we construct some processing facilities on the ISS. That way the entire process will be confined to outer space negating the huge costs of leaving and re-entering Earth.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Asteroid mining should really pick up if we construct some processing facilities on the ISS. That way the entire process will be confined to outer space negating the huge costs of leaving and re-entering Earth.

You still need to transport the final product to earth after processing, which means constant leaving and re-entering for the ship. So why bother putting the processing facility way up there for billions of dollars when it could be done for millions on earth?

[rvg]

You still need to transport the final product to earth after processing, which means constant leaving and re-entering for the ship. So why bother putting the processing facility way up there for billions of dollars when it could be done for millions on earth?

To use it to expand the ISS itself.

[Major Robert Dump]

Well since we are gutting our space program in America because we can't manage our infinite money, someone has to carry the torch.

[HopAlongBunny]

To use it to expand the ISS itself.

Possible. A very starry-eyed view would be for processing/manufacturing in space for space related "infrastructure".

[rvg]

Possible. A very starry-eyed view would be for processing/manufacturing in space for space related "infrastructure".

Space rock can be used to create hull space. Lots of hull space, can't have too much of that. Besides, hauling a whole asteroid down to Earth is wasteful, considering that 95% of it is likely to be garbage as far as Earth is concerned, but in space all that garbage can come in handy. Now, if you managed to find an asteroid made of solid gold, then yeah, down to Earth it goes. Barring that, might as well maximize the usefulness of those rocks.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Space rock can be used to create hull space. Lots of hull space, can't have too much of that. Besides, hauling a whole asteroid down to Earth is wasteful, considering that 95% of it is likely to be garbage as far as Earth is concerned, but in space all that garbage can come in handy. Now, if you managed to find an asteroid made of solid gold, then yeah, down to Earth it goes. Barring that, might as well maximize the usefulness of those rocks.

Rock isn't really that useful for orbiting space stations. It would be difficult to construct the proper architecture that is required to provide protection against micro meteorites. Big thick slab walls are actually not that great for high speed collisions.

[rvg]

Rock isn't really that useful for orbiting space stations. It would be difficult to construct the proper architecture that is required to provide protection against micro meteorites. Big thick slab walls are actually not that great for high speed collisions.

Rock has the advantage of being cheap and plentiful. Whatever damage occurs can be fixed with on hand materials.

[PanzerJaeger]

Well since we are gutting our space program in America because we can't manage our infinite money, someone has to carry the torch.

It is very interesting to watch private industry take over as government gets out of the space business. We will see how our space companies compete with China and India's space programs.

I would hope NASA could become an R&D clearing house to support these efforts, determining the feasibility of various proposals and passing out grants to promising ones. We should create a kind of space industrial complex, much like the military one that has produced some of our best technology. It is actually a pretty good model for developing very high cost, cutting edge tech.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Rock has the advantage of being cheap and plentiful. Whatever damage occurs can be fixed with on hand materials.

Not if the entire compartment gets destroyed every time a rock with the diameter of a dime hits it. Your notions of "cheap and plentiful" have no bearing on what needs to be done to survive space.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Even if this turns out to be a giant financial disaster, it will be important in advancing our extra-terrestrial capabilities. Sooner or later Humanity has to leave this rock, and its made a much harder goal because people are generally incapable (or unwilling) to look so far into the future.

Unless we somehow make a breakthrough in propulsion technology we won't be leaving the earth any time soon (~150yrs). Even if we had a ship that could constantly go 10% the speed of light, it would take nearly 2 days to reach Pluto.

[Noncommunist]

Unless we somehow make a breakthrough in propulsion technology we won't be leaving the earth any time soon (~150yrs). Even if we had a ship that could constantly go 10% the speed of light, it would take nearly 2 days to reach Pluto.

That said, we're still only a few days from the moon and a few months from Mars with everything we have now. So while the distances are certainly immense, I'd say that we could at least put a few bases down, perhaps get as far as our settlement of Antarctica.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

You're thinking small. If mankind is to endure for HUNDREDS of thousands of years, instead of the mere 10,000 or so years of written history we're at today, then we must find a way to go elsewhere. Its the ultimate holy grail of science and civilization. Staying on earth is like laying in your own coffin--sooner or later this planet won't be able to support life, whether its climate change, a rogue asteroid, nuclear war, or the sun burning out. Someone should be working on the route to space colonization at all times, in some capacity. Bravo to Cameron and Co. for having the fortitude to persue this in the face of blinding skepticism.

But if the time scale is hundreds of thousands of years then space colonization is not our most urgent problem--that would be ensuring nothing severe happens in the next couple hundred years.

But asteroid mining at least sounds like a reasonable project to restart the space age with...

[Sarmatian]

When this happens and when we figure out how to get energy for free (or extremely cheap), mankind will finally be able to live in abundance.

I believe our grandchildren will live in a such a world...

Here's to pioneers.

[gaelic cowboy]

There is not as much need for a reusable ship as you might think lads if humanity got serious about it we might build a space elevator.

It would be an enourmous project but the benefits would be massive if we could make it work, it will probably use some kind of carbon nanotube or the like and the killer app is the ability to send the ore down safely and cheaply from earth orbit.

Without it I would say asteroid mining is a pipe dream unless we can create some kind of cheap less polluting rocket, I would say though that a cheap less polluting rocket is even less likely than the space elevator.

[gaelic cowboy]

It is very interesting to watch private industry take over as government gets out of the space business. We will see how our space companies compete with China and India's space programs.

I would hope NASA could become an R&D clearing house to support these efforts, determining the feasibility of various proposals and passing out grants to promising ones. We should create a kind of space industrial complex, much like the military one that has produced some of our best technology. It is actually a pretty good model for developing very high cost, cutting edge tech.

One thing I would remind people about corporate space projects is the fact that there essentially rent seeking projects just like most millitary projects too. Thats not to say there are no benefits from rent seeking companies we can see that some have contributed to the security of the USA(but not all)

There will always be a need for some federal input most companies are not likely to want to study some aspects of it as there would be little or no return on investment. I expect the big push will be in attempting to harness solar energy out in space to be essentially beamed back to earth, the millitary applications of an essentially a free-ish energy source are huge.

Essentially were returning to an era simmilar to the early explorers who were funded by a mixture investors or the monarchs.

[gaelic cowboy]

One of the big ideas behind the asteroid mine deal is that they would be able to mind the asteroids for water and hydrogen--i.e. space-ship fuel. The largest hurdle facing space travel at the moment (aside from not being able to go fast enough to make interstellar travel practical) is the immense cost of getting the supplies (including fuel, water, and so forth) out of the Earth's gravity. These mines would be almost as good as a space elevator, since you'd be gathering the fuel in space and transporting it to other ships and satellites that are already in space, thus saving everyone a lot of money and time in the end.

The polluting rockets you're thinking of are such a big deal because they have to be used CONSTANTLY to break the earth's orbit every time we want to send something up there. Once your in space you don't need such elaborate methods of propulsion, at least not until we start looking at farther targets. The fuel provided by these mines would be renewable and cheap for things like the ISS and the countless satellites in orbit. All in all, a good launching point towards cost-effective space exploration.

I understand all that but our problem is that the ore has to come down eventually and in big enough quantities to make it useful. This is best achieved in my space elevator senario rather than using rockets of any kind be they poluting or not.


Of course that still does not mean a space elevator is even feasible, it's concievable allright but the technical details are so big I would say it would have to be a global project.

Failing all that we might build some sort of container that falls down from orbit with the decelaration slowed by simple parachutes, in order to bring down the cost we would probably have to make the container in orbit though. There is a danger though in sending worthwhile amounts down as we would be essentially firing asteroids to earth so it would require no mistakes.

[Whacker]

We've long had the technology and means to do stuff like asteroid mining. The problems center mainly around breaking new ground with the physics and mechanics of the actual activites, and the overall cost which is the biggest by far. Space is an extremely brutal, unforgiving environment for both man and machine. Extreme differences in temperatures, tons of dangerous/lethal levels of radiation, risks of collisions with other bodies, limitations on communications (speed of light, etc)... it goes on and on and on. It's certainly doable, but doing it in a cost-effective manner with "acceptable" levels of risk is something else entirely.

[rvg]

Not if the entire compartment gets destroyed every time a rock with the diameter of a dime hits it.

This is a non-issue. Current hulls provide no more protection than rock would, all that matters is how thick the hull can be made.

Your notions of "cheap and plentiful" have no bearing on what needs to be done to survive space.

Sure they do. Lack of building materials and huge costs associated with transporting them are major impediments. Asteroids can help alleviate that problem.

[a completely inoffensive name]

This is a non-issue. Current hulls provide no more protection than rock would, all that matters is how thick the hull can be made.

That is simply not true and I am telling you that. Metals can be fabricated to have many multiple thin layers with space in between them. This may be better for micrometeorite protection because the impact usually liquifies the object that is crashing into the space station. The thin layer with gaps may ensure minimum damage because the liquified meteorite will not have the cohesion after the first few layers to puncture the other layers. This is something that simply can't be done with rock.

[rvg]

That is simply not true and I am telling you that. Metals can be fabricated to have many multiple thin layers with space in between them. This may be better for micrometeorite protection because the impact usually liquifies the object that is crashing into the space station. The thin layer with gaps may ensure minimum damage because the liquified meteorite will not have the cohesion after the first few layers to puncture the other layers. This is something that simply can't be done with rock.

Asteroids contain a whole bunch of common metals, especially iron. That's the point of processing them in space, since Earth already has enough of iron.