Asteroid Mining.

[Blind groper]

Since we are currently experiencing a near miss by an asteroid, plus a titanic meteoric explosion over Russia, it struck me that it might be a good time to discuss the commercial exploitation of these lumps of rock. There is a group of very wealthy people currently gearing up to begin exploring near Earth asteroids as potential objects for exploitation.
http://www.planetaryresources.com/asteroids/

We tend to think of asteroids as being out of reach, beyond the orbit of Mars. However, there are some thousands of them which cross Earth's orbit. These are easier to land on than the moon, because they have little gravity, and a landing is more like a docking in space. With robotics reaching high levels of sophistication, it seems possible to land automatic machinery on such an asteroid, and let it go to work removing valuable materials, until the asteroid next passes close to Earth. At that point, the purified metals, like platinum, rubidium, technetium etc., which have massive value per gram, are 'tossed' into lower Earth orbit, from which point they can be recovered.

A simple calculation shows that there are literally trillions of dollars worth of rare elements in just those asteroids that pass close to Earth. The thing is that, on Earth, heavy metals (over billions of years) have tended to sink to the Earth's core. But in asteroids, where there has never been the gravity and planetary bulk to do that, valuable minerals are exposed and available for mining.

Obviously, mining asteroids is not something that will happen in the very near future, but what do you guys think of the idea? Will this happen, and when?

[Svartalf]

Not economically feasible yet... getting the miners and equipment to the rocks still costs too much.

[Audley Strange]

Depends if it's actually profitable.

Perhaps some kind of orbital space trawling net?

[MiM]

Don't know about the feasibility of getting those down to earth. But if we ever get as far as to build a sizeable space station, that would obviously be much cheaper to build in space from asteroid materials, than to ship the materials up the gravity of earth.

[Blind groper]

Good point, MiM

I wonder if it might be sufficient to sell to space operations, in order to make some asteroid mining economic? That is, without having to get stuff down to Earth?

[JimC]

In addition, a widespread system of asteroid mining would mean people and technologies in place well equipped to deal with an asteroid on course for Earth.

[Jason]

I suggest we build a huge quantum entanglement net to catch asteroids! That's how quantum shit works right?

[Tero]

I can offer a bug zapper on a fishing line. Long enough?

[Tyrannical]

Not too keen on the idea of a controlled crash of an asteroid into the Earth for mining purposes, because that's the only way I see it as feasible. It is just to expensive to move heavy mining equipment out of Earth's gravitational field with chemical propellents.

[cronus]

The Middle East and the USA are suffering persistent drought along with a rapidly dimishing watertable, and engineering science can't even transport a few icebergs across a few thousands miles. The idea that humans have or are likely to develop asteroid mining capabilities in the near term is pure hubris.

[Pappa]

A space elevator would be ideal for this, shame they're such a long way off. I just had an idea... how about a space elevator powered by the gravitational pull on an attached asteroid? Stuff could be winched up to space as the asteroid was lowered down gently. I suppose keeping the elevator gravitationally tethered with all that mass attached would be pretty expensive energy-wise though.

[Tyrannical]

The Middle East and the USA are suffering persistent drought along with a rapidly dimishing watertable, and engineering science can't even transport a few icebergs across a few thousands miles. The idea that humans have or are likely to develop asteroid mining capabilities in the near term is pure hubris.

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/a ... s/243364/#

Looks like there was some success in the mid 1800s to use icebergs as a source of ice, and in modern times to move them away from oil rigs.

[Blind groper]

Not too keen on the idea of a controlled crash of an asteroid into the Earth for mining purposes,

I very much doubt that is what the business people behind the idea intend. Since the minerals have to go down only, I do not see a major problem. I could envisage a giant ball of valuable metals, encased in a silicate shell (also from what is mined) and with a series of parachutes to get it down in a slow and controlled fashion. The silicates will be a heat shield while it falls very quickly, and possibly in a delta shape to permit reasonable control of the fall. The parachutes progressively slow it down till it hits the ground at a speed sufficiently slow not to be a problem.

[JimC]

Not too keen on the idea of a controlled crash of an asteroid into the Earth for mining purposes,

I very much doubt that is what the business people behind the idea intend. Since the minerals have to go down only, I do not see a major problem. I could envisage a giant ball of valuable metals, encased in a silicate shell (also from what is mined) and with a series of parachutes to get it down in a slow and controlled fashion. The silicates will be a heat shield while it falls very quickly, and possibly in a delta shape to permit reasonable control of the fall. The parachutes progressively slow it down till it hits the ground at a speed sufficiently slow not to be a problem.

However, if someone makes a mistake, tens of thousands could die.

I see asteroid mining as a source of materials for space structures...

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Much easier to set up a moon base and drop mined asteroid minerals there - less gravity = less kapow!