beltstrike

[flykiller]

Actually - it can be done. Solar panels can provide the energy.

ok, it can't be done in a timely and cost-efficient manner.

All we need to do is invest the money to make it possible.

money isn't the issue. the issue is cost. for example there's quite a bit of gold in our local oceans, but it costs more to precipitate it out of salt water than the gold is worth. space ops will be even less efficient.

If western governments won't the Chinese will...

(smile) sure. they build ghost cities, why not build space-ghost mining operations. they could call it "the golden lucky money south sea people's sky mine" or something.

initial bases are already planned by several nations.

plans are a dime a dozen. almost literally. operations are costly. for example the mars rovers cost (iirc) $40 million, and they were just little wagon-sized buggies that didn't even return or send anything back. an operation to get sufficient equipment to an asteroid, break it up any useful quantity of material, and then bring the material back in a controlled manner, will be exponentially more costly. can't see it being profitable. it would be much more profitable for investors to put up billboards all around the country saying "private investor wants to buy your gold, call 1-800-something".

 

[aramis]

Some facts: Current gold price: around $4400 per kg, or $4.4M per ton.
A heat shield and parachutes can land some 20+ tons from orbit for launch cost plus about $15K ... that leaves $28M to get the gold and get it to the skeletal shield and chutes, given a $65M launch. At present, that looks unlikely... a $10M high-delta-V refillable can make it workable.

Trip 1 is upfront cost. 2-4 recovery probes, ion-drive. No science instruments, only minimum nav and grapple.
Trip 2 is refills for trip 1's birds, and maybe a couple more, and an empty return.
Trip 3 reuses the return, and refules the birds.
Repeat.
By about trip 7, you're profiting if you haven't collapsed the market.

 

[flykiller]

if you haven't collapsed the market

and that's a whole 'nuther issue - the economics. dumping $600 million worth of gold on the market (and you'd have to, to pay for your operations) means it's no longer worth $600 million, it's worth a lot less, meaning you have to get more and dump more, meaning it's worth even less. and keep in mind that existing costs are based on single missions, not sustained operations that require maintenance and replacement.

can't do it.

 

[Barrel]

No need to dump it all at once--amortize it. Borrow money to replace the cash you spent getting the space gold, with an agreement to pay it off over 30 to 50 years. Companies and governments issue bonds of that duration now. The terms of the bond could even specify repayment in bullion.

 

[aramis]

No need to dump it all at once--amortize it. Borrow money to replace the cash you spent getting the space gold, with an agreement to pay it off over 30 to 50 years. Companies and governments issue bonds of that duration now. The terms of the bond could even specify repayment in bullion.

I suspect Bezos or Branson could float about 10 flights on spec, provided they can keep things going on other projects. Balmer could, too. (Gates has sunk his wealth elsewhere.)

Heck, Besos and Branson working together could create a gold cartel to rival DeBeers Diamond Cartel.

 

[Straybow]

Psyche is believed to be a failed planetary core. Unlike other asteroids, it is consolidated and compacted material rather than the loose clump of gravel that is more typical. That means extraction will be nearly as tough as on Earth, except for the microgravity.

Psyche is nearly 3 AU out, so solar panels will get only 1/9th as much power as Earth satellite panels get. It would take a huge solar array on Earth to run mining and smelting ops. We are decades away from the launch capacity we'd need to get such panels that far out.

 

[mike wightman]

That's why we need moon bases for a space industrial revolution...

 

[aramis]

Psyche is believed to be a failed planetary core. Unlike other asteroids, it is consolidated and compacted material rather than the loose clump of gravel that is more typical. That means extraction will be nearly as tough as on Earth, except for the microgravity.

Psyche is nearly 3 AU out, so solar panels will get only 1/9th as much power as Earth satellite panels get. It would take a huge solar array on Earth to run mining and smelting ops. We are decades away from the launch capacity we'd need to get such panels that far out.

The launch capacity exists already. It's the mining and relocation that's not.
And the mining can be made easier by instead relocating the asteroid to earth orbit.

 

[flykiller]

And the mining can be made easier by instead relocating the asteroid to earth orbit.

... uh ... yeah, the MINING could be made easier by just bringing the WHOLE THING here first ....

 

[Timerover51]

The launch capacity exists already. It's the mining and relocation that's not.
And the mining can be made easier by instead relocating the asteroid to earth orbit.

Having, in theory, that much gold sitting overhead might also tank the market, or at the very least, reduce the price by quite a bit. After all, they do have to recover their costs in moving the asteroid and then retaining the mining capacity.

 

[Condottiere]

Or you can re-establish the Gold Standard.

Or strategically threaten those who've been hoarding.

 

[Straybow]

At 2E19 kg, all the oil produced in the world, if devoted to the effort, split between fuel sent to propel the asteroid and the fuel required to launch it from earth to the asteroid, couldn't bring the asteroid here in a century. And, of course, we can't devote the entire transportation resources of the world for a century much less reach that launch capacity.

If we could magically use the energy to move the asteroid, a century at present production rates would amount to 25 kWh per kg. That would easily do it... of course, if we can magically move the asteroid we don't need the gold.

 

[mike wightman]

You do not need to use the Earth's resources to provide the kinetic energy.

The asteroid has gravitational potential energy, lots of it. Give it a nudge and its orbit changes - it can fall towards the sun and potential energy becomes kinetic energy. This kinetic energy changes its orbit a bit more. Change its orbit to be in the viscinity of Earth from time to time and at these times of closest approach send the payloads of gold extracet by your minng robots.

Painting once side of the asteroid white would be enough - it would just take a long time, a very long time. Or put an ion engine powered by solar panels or a nuclear reactor. Again it will take a long time but not as long as painting it.

I would be very wary of trying to put this thing in actual orbit around the Earth or moon since it is going to be going a tad fast as it flies by on its new orbit.

The simplest method, and probably the cheapest, would be to send a robotic mining operation there powered by solar or nuclear. The robots would mine the gold and manufacture fuel for the return trip.
(can't gold be used as propellant for an ion engine... or you could build a mass driver and use waste rock as reaction mass)

 

[BRJN]

The chunks you cut off the asteroid do not have to be neat. Send a series of small pieces (that would burn up in atmosphere in the event you are clumsy) which will fit into your in-orbit processing machinery. Small-ish vehicles to collect the arriving chunks can have higher speeds and maneuverability than if they had to handle multi-deca-ton asteroidlets.

Of course this stops working well when there are two rivals trying to catch the incoming rocks.

 

[kilemall]

The chunks you cut off the asteroid do not have to be neat. Send a series of small pieces (that would burn up in atmosphere in the event you are clumsy) which will fit into your in-orbit processing machinery. Small-ish vehicles to collect the arriving chunks can have higher speeds and maneuverability than if they had to handle multi-deca-ton asteroidlets.

Of course this stops working well when there are two rivals trying to catch the incoming rocks.

IMTU the LaGrange points host solar foundries, originally built to melt tailings from He³ lunar mining into orbital city colonies. They get repurposed into asteroid smelters, and yes the chunks need to be small to be allowed anywhere near Earth.


It's a continuous stream, a river of rock that keeps the industrial machine fed. Course, what makes that work is Traveller M-Drive and power plants, continuous accel/decel.

 

[flykiller]

Of course this stops working well when there are two rivals trying to catch the incoming rocks.

(laugh) sounds like a grade-school dodgeball contest ....

Course, what makes that work is Traveller M-Drive and power plants

bingo. chemical fuels and solar panels can't do it.

 

[mike wightman]

Yes they can. It's a question of investment, not capability.

When it is cheaper to harvest rare earths and the like from asteroids than it is to try and exploit the dwindling resources here on Earth then it will be done.

 

[flykiller]

It's a question of investment, not capability.

in theory, sure. in practice investors want to see returns on their investments within their lifetimes, and if they don't see those returns then they just won't invest.

When it is cheaper to harvest rare earths and the like from asteroids than it is to try and exploit the dwindling resources here on Earth then it will be done.

in theory, sure. in practice the costs would be so high that no-one will be able, let alone willing, to muster the resources to do so.

 

[mike wightman]

The cost to orbit is dropping. Moon stations and bases will be built. Once the bases are built industry will follow. Cost will fall again.

In thirty years time when the world is being held to ransom by those few countries that have the mineral resources the alternative option to catastrophic war will be space industry and resource exploitation.

Trouble is China, Russia and possibly India may well get there first.

 

[flykiller]

China, Russia, and possibly India

nah. china's debt ponzi economy is rolling over, not to mention they're on the edge of a huge demographic decline. russia ... maybe. they have the tech, but they lack the economic weight. as for india, they're like brazil - the superpower of the future, and always will be.

Moon stations and bases will be built.

and they'll suffer the same fates as the viking colonies in vinland and greenland.