Will space mining ever be a thing or is it strictly science fiction? Is there anything in space worth mining or collecting?
ITT: Is / will space mining ever be a thing?
Ian Walker
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Brayden Kelly
Of course.
Consider the cost of getting things onto an asteroid/moving it into orbit.
Well estimate this at ~20billion USD.
Comet weighs several hundred million pounds
Composition percent gold/platinum/iridium/rubuim 5% which is pretty low for alot of them
5% of 500 million is 25 million pounds at $1000 per ounce is 400billion.
Not a bad profit
Gabriel Reyes
yeah good point. Thanks
Adam Williams
I always see this but every time I read it up I see a lot of things that counter my little understanding on econ 101.
It will become a thing once there's a need for it. As of now, there's nothing there that we couldn't find here (correct me if I am wrong??) in enough quantities to sustain our markets.
Easton Flores
Only if some kind of memetic drive is invented, and then it will only robots living there because human eyeballs deform in 0g and the amount of energy required to spin an asteroid sufficiently is more than the total generated on Earth right now for a century.
Charles Sullivan
Why? Refer to you can launch materials back to earth in disposable capsules because the asteroid will have such little gravity.
Tyler Sullivan
Yes and if Musk was legit and not a fucking memer he'd be focusing on that instead of populating a shit hole desert planet
>mfw I claim Anteros and become a space trillionaire
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Anthony Bailey
If the refining took place in space, it would overall be a more effective system.
Juan Carter
What the fuck are those approximations? 4 trillion to mine a 3 km wide asteroid?
>Mine asteroid, robots made of gold
>Disposable platinum rockets
>Burn cash for propellant
>Send 1/2 of mined materials into sun
>Guys we made 1 trillion profit
Isaac Mitchell
>Leave gravity well
>Create in-orbit facilities that can process resources
>Use space mining to get resources that dont have to move up a gravity well
Call me when we have a hollowed out Eros station and the Navoo is complete, senpai