# Plans for asteroid mining emerge



## Shahada (Apr 26, 2010)

NekoNinja said:


> And then it is basically ignoring the importance of this (and how completely awesome it is.) If this project works out, it will pave the way for future space exploration, mining, and even potentially habitation. Mining for water (a necessary yet very expensive resource in space) and other resources could very seriously boost not just our resources on this planet, but our space endeavors.


I don't think people are so much saying that it wouldn't be a great thing if it succeeded, but that its a huge long shot, is not practical or affordable by any stretch of the imagination, and wastes time and money on sci-fi pipe dreams that could be used to tackle real problems on the earth right now. You might say tapping asteroids for resource extraction is trying to solve problems on the planet but with the current technology you well know that it will cost far more resources to extract these resources than would be gained and there's no real indication on the horizon that that's going to change any time soon.


NekoNinja said:


> At a first glance this may not seem too bad considering the decent amount of funds NASA seems to get, however these funds aren't being used productively. Rather than doing actual science the majority of funds are going into things like low Earth orbit nonsense, and various things that no astronomers actually want to be doing research in. Because of this, funding is often cut from the more important things such as successors to the Hubble Telescope.


What's your basis for calling the various low Earth orbit projects "nonsense?" I don't think NASA does a perfect job but I'm curious what specifically is so worthless about these projects.


NekoNinja said:


> Issues like these are the reason as to why private companies taking up space exploration is such big and great news. The news provided in this thread is really huge despite that people don't seem to recognize it, and the government's utter incompetence when it comes to science should give no illusion that they might somehow have something to do with this.


Aren't you worried that such research funded by private companies will be conducted primarily in the interests of the bottom line of those companies? Scientific progress is of course a good thing, but I can't help but feel that letting a few billionaires decide the direction space exploration is going to take in the future isn't going to be particularly helpful for most of the planet. You talk about the government not having enough input from "scientists" or whatever but what makes you think private companies will listen to scientists any more, especially if what a scientist is saying doesn't make them money? Further, in the case of NASA, why should massive taxpayer-funded programs like NASA not be under the control of politicians in the first place? What's the alternative, a cabal of techno-priests?


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

@Shahada

Low orbit stuff is called nonsense because _there is nothing there_.

It's like trying to do ocean exploration with your ship still tied to the dock. Maybe your ship tied to the dock is not _entirely_ useless, but it doesn't further your goals, and they just keep spending money on ships that are still tied to the dock.

"Yay! We went a little bit further than a plane can fly! But there's nothing here! Everything relevant is still very, very far away!"


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## Shahada (Apr 26, 2010)

sprinkles said:


> @ShahadaLow orbit stuff is called nonsense because there is nothing there.It's like trying to do ocean exploration with your ship still tied to the dock. Maybe your ship tied to the dock is not entirely useless, but it doesn't further your goals, and they just keep spending money on ships that are still tied to the dock."Yay! We went a little bit further than a plane can fly! But there's nothing here! Everything relevant is still very, very far away!"


That's assuming the only goal of NASA should be space exploration. It seems to me there's all sorts of valuable research that can be done at such a level of orbit (weather patterns and such). Just because it's not related to exploration for the sake of exploration does not mean it is not worthwhile research or that the expenditures are a waste. Again though, I am not an expert here, so if it turns out there actually is no valuable work to be done in low orbit then I'm open to being corrected.


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## vt1099ace (Jun 8, 2009)

hmmm, asteriods?
If it where me I'd figure out a way of recovering all the junk from all the launch rockets, broken satilites and scrap that's in close orbit....already has refined metals, gold, silver, copper, aluminum etc....lots of potential profit floating out there not to mention the navigation hazard.


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

Shahada said:


> That's assuming the only goal of NASA should be space exploration. It seems to me there's all sorts of valuable research that can be done at such a level of orbit (weather patterns and such). Just because it's not related to exploration for the sake of exploration does not mean it is not worthwhile research or that the expenditures are a waste. Again though, I am not an expert here, so if it turns out there actually is no valuable work to be done in low orbit then I'm open to being corrected.


Well that stuff is useful but it is pretty old and NASA is really bad at it because they've been so politically motivated. There isn't much that NASA can do that Russia, or private organizations, couldn't do for a fraction of the cost.

If you want to put something in space right now, ask Russia. They'll do it for like a 10th of the cost it takes for NASA to pull it off.


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## Shahada (Apr 26, 2010)

sprinkles said:


> Well that stuff is useful but it is pretty old and NASA is really bad at it because they've been so politically motivated. There isn't much that NASA can do that Russia, or private organizations, couldn't do for a fraction of the cost.If you want to put something in space right now, ask Russia. They'll do it for like a 10th of the cost it takes for NASA to pull it off.


Do you think the Russian space program is not also subject to political concerns, now or in the past when it was the Soviet space program? Of course it was. But that doesn't seem to have hurt their efficiency by your own admission. No one's denying NASA has problems, rather I'm questioning whether the solution is "leave space exploration to the billionaires."


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

Shahada said:


> Do you think the Russian space program is not also subject to political concerns, now or in the past when it was the Soviet space program? Of course it was. But that doesn't seem to have hurt their efficiency by your own admission. No one's denying NASA has problems, rather I'm questioning whether the solution is "leave space exploration to the billionaires."


Well the idea is to let people who have the money and won't dick around wasting it on things that don't get stuff actually done to put some things out there, then when NASA or whoever finally decides it wants to do some actual science, they can hitch a ride on the orbital express flight or whatever for a lot cheaper, and get to the relevant area of study quicker, than trying to piddle around and do it all themselves.


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## Shahada (Apr 26, 2010)

sprinkles said:


> Well the idea is to let people who have the money and won't dick around wasting it on things that don't get stuff actually done to put some things out there, then when NASA or whoever finally decides it wants to do some actual science, they can hitch a ride on the orbital express flight or whatever for a lot cheaper, and get to the relevant area of study quicker, than trying to piddle around and do it all themselves.


Well obviously I hope more responsible and accountable organizations build on the lessons of these missions, if they are going to happen anyway I hope some good comes out of them. I just think in general there's better uses of resources. But that leads to a debate about whether or not single individuals capable of funding such enormous expenditures should even be allowed to exist in the first place, which is an entirely different subject.


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## NekoNinja (Apr 18, 2010)

Shahada said:


> I don't think people are so much saying that it wouldn't be a great thing if it succeeded, but that its a huge long shot, is not practical or affordable by any stretch of the imagination, and wastes time and money on sci-fi pipe dreams that could be used to tackle real problems on the earth right now. You might say tapping asteroids for resource extraction is trying to solve problems on the planet but with the current technology you well know that it will cost far more resources to extract these resources than would be gained and there's no real indication on the horizon that that's going to change any time soon.


This was all covered in the article I initially posted. As for using money on this rather than on "real problems on earth" I will start by stating that they can do whatever they want with their money, not to mention that spending it on something has got to better for the economy than letting it sit in a bank somewhere (although correct me if I'm wrong, as I don't like to pretend to know much about economics.) And secondly, scientific advancement of any kind helps those of us here on earth and often unexpectedly. Example:

THIS is why we invest in science. This. | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine



> What's your basis for calling the various low Earth orbit projects "nonsense?" I don't think NASA does a perfect job but I'm curious what specifically is so worthless about these projects.


I'm sorry, but doing things like continually sending people into low earth orbit is just a waste of money. Unless of course you see some great use here? Certainly there is nothing wrong with low earth projects, however as far as I can tell there is mass agreement among scientists in these fields in that we should be spending more money on other things such as deep exploration. I could see us trying to send people to Mars, or something like that, which I'm not terribly opposed to (for various reasons and despite that its economically better to just send things like rovers), yet we haven't sent anyone out of low Earth orbit in 40 years. Really, this is why I'm glad the old space shuttle era has ended. At this point it wasn't doing anything but wasting a lot of money that could have been put to better use on deep space exploration. I don't like to blame NASA for most of their problems, since they tend to be the fault of those in the government for continually cutting funds on important research and projects, and simply the political issues effecting things overall. One of the biggest problems with NASA funding is simply that the politicians don't at all listen to the scientists supposedly advising them, and they simply ignore the complaints of the scientific community. A few examples of the situation that should speak for themselves:

Whence NASA? | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine

President Obama’s NASA budget unveiled | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine

The watershed moment for JWST | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine

NASA’s budget: JWST saved, but not much good news | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine


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## NekoNinja (Apr 18, 2010)

vt1099ace said:


> hmmm, asteriods?
> If it where me I'd figure out a way of recovering all the junk from all the launch rockets, broken satilites and scrap that's in close orbit....already has refined metals, gold, silver, copper, aluminum etc....lots of potential profit floating out there not to mention the navigation hazard.


Japan has already basically beat you to this idea (well in a way.) 

Japan's space agency teams up with fishing net maker to collect space debris - Telegraph


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

NekoNinja said:


> Japan has already basically beat you to this idea (well in a way.)
> 
> Japan's space agency teams up with fishing net maker to collect space debris - Telegraph


Now if they can only find a way to keep it rather than incinerating it. XD


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## NekoNinja (Apr 18, 2010)

sprinkles said:


> Now if they can only find a way to keep it rather than incinerating it. XD


Meh, its pretty much like any other meteorite that hits the planet. "Every day about 100 tons of meteoroids -- fragments of dust and gravel and sometimes even big rocks – enter the Earth's atmosphere. Stand out under the stars for more than a half an hour on a clear night and you'll likely see a few of the meteors produced by the onslaught."


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

NekoNinja said:


> Meh, its pretty much like any other meteorite that hits the planet. "Every day about 100 tons of meteoroids -- fragments of dust and gravel and sometimes even big rocks – enter the Earth's atmosphere. Stand out under the stars for more than a half an hour on a clear night and you'll likely see a few of the meteors produced by the onslaught."


Well yeah, I mean actually recovering the materials with the net like vt1099ace was talking about, rather than just destroying them to get them out of the way.


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## NekoNinja (Apr 18, 2010)

sprinkles said:


> Well yeah, I mean actually recovering the materials with the net like vt1099ace was talking about, rather than just destroying them to get them out of the way.


Well you do still have to consider the cost of actually putting them in something and then sending them back to the planet. Or rather, the cost of actually _building something, sending it up there,_ collecting them and then send it back down. I would presume the cost of all that would be more than the benefit of the little bit of materials, plus its a lot of work and money for materials that you could just get on the planet.


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

NekoNinja said:


> Well you do still have to consider the cost of actually putting them in something and then sending them back to the planet. Or rather, the cost of actually _building something, sending it up there,_ collecting them and then send it back down. I would presume the cost of all that would be more than the benefit of the little bit of materials, plus its a lot of work and money for materials that you could just get on the planet.


They are making a net to collect this stuff anyway so it's already pretty much throwing money away to clear space since the net will get burned up too.

They are already planning the 'build something to send up' part. Getting it back down is pretty simple, they just need something that has a return mission, collect the stuff, and meet the two up somehow. I'd think if they have a bunch of crap in a net already in space it would be pretty trivial to tow it around.

And honestly if they can't pull _that_ off then for sure as hell there will be no asteroid mining.


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## NekoNinja (Apr 18, 2010)

sprinkles said:


> They are making a net to collect this stuff anyway so it's already pretty much throwing money away to clear space since the net will get burned up too.
> 
> They are already planning the 'build something to send up' part. Getting it back down is pretty simple, they just need something that has a return mission, collect the stuff, and meet the two up somehow. I'd think if they have a bunch of crap in a net already in space it would be pretty trivial to tow it around.
> 
> And honestly if they can't pull _that_ off then for sure as hell there will be no asteroid mining.


This is Japan doing the net thing, not the group with future plans of asteroid mining. XD Still, I don't think Japan is really worried about obtaining space junk. The goal is simply to clear it up some so that it will stop damaging satellites and causing issues (or potential future issues.) And also, simply putting a net up there to float around until it gradually gets magnetically attracted with the planet is a lot different than lugging up something to actually hold all this stuff to bring it safely back down to earth. You would need a quite big container, and something like that costs a lot more fuel to bring up. It's also somewhat costly to send things back down to Earth as well (which is one reason why theres so much junk up there in the first place.)


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

NekoNinja said:


> This is Japan doing the net thing, not the group with future plans of asteroid mining. XD Still, I don't think Japan is really worried about obtaining space junk. The goal is simply to clear it up some so that it will stop damaging satellites and causing issues (or potential future issues.) And also, simply putting a net up there to float around until it gradually gets magnetically attracted with the planet is a lot different than lugging up something to actually hold all this stuff to bring it safely back down to earth. You would need a quite big container, and something like that costs a lot more fuel to bring up. It's also somewhat costly to send things back down to Earth as well (which is one reason why theres so much junk up there in the first place.)


All that applies to asteroid mining, too.

Also, all of this stuff collectively is a testament in the big picture to how much junk has actually went up in the first place. Yes, a huge container would be needed, because a huge amount of stuff was sent out there in the first place, never to return, _and none of this produced any kind of resource gain._

Whether it is profitable or not at this point is a bit irrelevant since all the junk out there has been effectively thrown away for no resource return. 

The only reason there are so many empty rocket stages and crap out there in the first place is because of the fuel required to get out there vs mass. Craft once in space don't need a lot of fuel, and therefore don't need the giant boosters which hold the fuel, so it drops them to increase efficiency of the remaining fuel that they do carry.

I think it would be interesting to pull off just to see if it could be done. It would also be good practice for later on.


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## Shahada (Apr 26, 2010)

NekoNinja said:


> This was all covered in the article I initially posted. As for using money on this rather than on "real problems on earth" I will start by stating that they can do whatever they want with their money, not to mention that spending it on something has got to better for the economy than letting it sit in a bank somewhere (although correct me if I'm wrong, as I don't like to pretend to know much about economics.) And secondly, scientific advancement of any kind helps those of us here on earth and often unexpectedly.


So you have no problem with enormously wealthy billionaires who will never want for anything using their fortunes on sci-fi pipe dreams rather than working to fix practical problems that the majority of the globe faces daily? I guess that's just a philosophical difference because I find it deplorable. I guess it's easy to say billionaires can do whatever they want with your money when you yourself have a relatively comfortable life though. As to your other points, spending is not necessarily better than letting money sit in the bank, it depends on what its being spent on. This project doesn't seem obviously harmful to me, at first glance anyway, I more just object to the world's financial overlords blowing money on spaceships while people are dying of starvation and preventable diseases. As to your last point about "technology being good for everyone," this is a vast oversimplification and not really true. A lot of technology only benefits certain interests and classes, for example, most modern technology in the financial sector is utterly irrelevant to everyone on the planet minus the investor class. It helps them efficiently accumulate wealth, but it doesn't do so for most people and in fact largely accelerates the global transfer of wealth to global elites.


NekoNinja said:


> I'm sorry, but doing things like continually sending people into low earth orbit is just a waste of money. Unless of course you see some great use here? Certainly there is nothing wrong with low earth projects, however as far as I can tell there is mass agreement among scientists in these fields in that we should be spending more money on other things such as deep exploration.


Are there no scientists working on these low Earth orbit projects? Do the ones working on them see them as worthless as well? Where's the mass agreement of scientists? I'd like to see something more substantial than articles from pop science magazines. As I said before, low earth research seems pretty important to understanding issues like climate change - isn't climate change a more pressing issue for most of the people on the planet than space mining, even if the latter sounds a lot cooler?


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## vt1099ace (Jun 8, 2009)

NekoNinja said:


> Japan has already basically beat you to this idea (well in a way.)
> 
> Japan's space agency teams up with fishing net maker to collect space debris - Telegraph


Good, with the tens of thousands of bits floating around someone needs to...but why do I get the mental image of an astronaut with a shopping cart filled with huge full sacks looking for the a remdemption center?


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## NekoNinja (Apr 18, 2010)

Shahada said:


> So you have no problem with enormously wealthy billionaires who will never want for anything using their fortunes on sci-fi pipe dreams rather than working to fix practical problems that the majority of the globe faces daily? I guess that's just a philosophical difference because I find it deplorable. I guess it's easy to say billionaires can do whatever they want with your money when you yourself have a relatively comfortable life though. As to your other points, spending is not necessarily better than letting money sit in the bank, it depends on what its being spent on. This project doesn't seem obviously harmful to me, at first glance anyway, I more just object to the world's financial overlords blowing money on spaceships while people are dying of starvation and preventable diseases. As to your last point about "technology being good for everyone," this is a vast oversimplification and not really true. A lot of technology only benefits certain interests and classes, for example, most modern technology in the financial sector is utterly irrelevant to everyone on the planet minus the investor class. It helps them efficiently accumulate wealth, but it doesn't do so for most people and in fact largely accelerates the global transfer of wealth to global elites.


I dont understand your obsession with positing science as if it's at odds with other issues. 

Certainly there are other issues that we need to be tackling. But you know what else it would be nice to put a bit of money into? Some science. The idea that you seem to be inferring here that we should drop space exploration because there are "other problems" is rediculous. You are presenting a false dichotomy here. 

Its this sort of black and white thinking that you seem to have that ends up being one of the reasons as to why I continually discontinue debates with you. Another issue is that you never seem to grasp the points I make. When I debate others, I never seem to have this problem, yet with you, a large amount of your responses tend to be you twisting my words to fit whatever preconcieved notions you seem to have about my position. Just look at the supposed quote of me you responded to: "technology being good for everyone." I state that science (even astronomy) does help those of us here on Earth, gave a quick example, and somehow you want to take this as meaning that I don't understand how some technologies only benefit certain groups. It's a strawman and red herring. 

I'm not sure about you, but I support science since it can actually help to solve problems like hunger, poor water, better and cheaper energy, and etc. If these technologies don't ever manage to have an impact on society, then it isn't the science that is at fault but rather the economics and politics of the situation. And yes, I do indeed also support space exploration. The truth of the situation is that the money spent on things like NASA projects is small change compared to various other things that money is continually wasted on. As Philip Plait put it "Over the past few years, the rate of money spent in Afghanistan and Iraq is about 20 million dollars per hour. In other words, the amount of money being cut from Mars exploration is equal to what we were spending on the War on Terror in just 15 hours." 

From what I can tell, I doubt its that you have an issue with science here, but rather that you simply have an issue with what individual people value and are spending money on. Personally, I don't see it in way you do. So long as these people are spending their money on something actually productive I tend to be fairly happy. Certainly I wish more people would take time and give money to charities and such to try and help the poor and starving. I'd say this is especially true for the billionaires of the world. However, unlike you I don't posit this as a competition between science and something like hunger.

I have posted this video many times on this site before, and I will be glad to post it agian:






"Oh but Neko, surely something like searching for life on Mars would be interesting, but how exactly does it at all help solve any Earthly problems?" 

Discovering extraterestrial life could have quite a huge impact on our own planet. Not only does it give us more information about the universe and our origins, but a discovery like this could pave the way of improvement on various fields, and I would guess most notably the field of medicine. To show this, we really only need to look at the continual benefit of newly discovered bacteria and uses for bacteria, notably extremophile bacteria. While the specifics of what potential technology and medicines might bring are basically impossible to predict, I have no doubt the discoveries and benefits will be extraordinary. 



> Are there no scientists working on these low Earth orbit projects? Do the ones working on them see them as worthless as well? Where's the mass agreement of scientists? I'd like to see something more substantial than articles from pop science magazines. As I said before, low earth research seems pretty important to understanding issues like climate change - isn't climate change a more pressing issue for most of the people on the planet than space mining, even if the latter sounds a lot cooler?


Certainly studying climate change is important, however I am not talking about climate change, I am talking about astronomy and space exploration. There is nothing wrong exactly with low orbit projects to study the climate. However, there is something wrong with focusing solely on that (while also wasting a lot of other money) and ignoring space exploration. Or as Bill Nye put it:


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