Corporate Space Mining Megathread!!111

[grumbler]

Well, it'd be a problem for people holding the metals in question, but I was thinking more of the accuracy of the value estimates on the asteroid.

  Someone spotted the elephant in the room!

[HVC]

Industrialization is about making money, and space travel is too expensive to be profitable right now. Unless they find a solid gold asteroid, I don't see how this could work and be profitable.

which would devalue gold to the point it's not worth it to space mine anymore.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Well, it'd be a problem for people holding the metals in question, but I was thinking more of the accuracy of the value estimates on the asteroid.

  Someone spotted the elephant in the room!

Quick, someone go get Juan Carlos!

[jimmy olsen]

Looks like asteroid mining it is!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/20/planetary-resources-space-startup_n_1438936.html

But a source who spoke to Diamandis about his venture — and did not want to be identified because the discussion was private — confirmed to The Huffington Post that Planetary Resources does, in fact, plan to mine asteroids for precious raw materials.

[Neil]

An anonymous source?  You suck.

[Josquius]

Tamas, why would anyone be interested in zero-G factories when Chinese ones are more cost-effective?  Hell, it'd even be cheaper to use expensive, First World unionized labour with untenable pensions than it would be to use robots in space.

This seems like a plan to bilk Cameron and Google out of some money, because the technology for asteroid mining is still a long ways away, and the space travel industry has pretty much stagnated.

I recall reading long ago that there are certain things that can only be built in micro-gravity conditions.
What these are though I can't remember....super huge TV screens I think were one but....that is using old technology, I think we've found a work around to that these days.

[Jaron]

Certain medical procedures would be a lot less risky in zero grav conditions, but a lot more expensive. And Obamacare doesn't cover trips to the moon.

[Tamas]

It wouldn't be on the moon

What all this putting me in mood for, is a High Frontier PBEM game.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Certain medical procedures would be a lot less risky in zero grav conditions, but a lot more expensive. And Obamacare doesn't cover trips to the moon.

the moon isn't zero-g :p

[Faeelin]

What procedures would be safer in space?

[Neil]

Certain medical procedures would be a lot less risky in zero grav conditions, but a lot more expensive. And Obamacare doesn't cover trips to the moon.

the moon isn't zero-g :p

Nowhere is, really.  What people used to call zero-g is today called microgravity.

[Eddie Teach]

Nowhere is, really.  What people used to call zero-g is today called microgravity.

Not in the vernacular.

[Iormlund]

Now, solar power satellites, that would be compelling.

That's the most interesting use I see for space-mining. Low grav also has advantages for certain manufacturing processes as well.

[DontSayBanana]

That's the most interesting use I see for space-mining. Low grav also has advantages for certain manufacturing processes as well.

Sure, but there'd have to be insane amounts of shuttling- low or zero gravity might be advantageous for some manufacturing processes, but it seems like most of our material refinement processes are heavily reliant on gravity feed.  Can you imagine the pain in the ass of trying to refine iron or steel in zero gravity?  Do we even have good materials for enclosing a smelting process to keep the molten metal from going everywhere?

[Crazy_Ivan80]

That's the most interesting use I see for space-mining. Low grav also has advantages for certain manufacturing processes as well.

Sure, but there'd have to be insane amounts of shuttling- low or zero gravity might be advantageous for some manufacturing processes, but it seems like most of our material refinement processes are heavily reliant on gravity feed.  Can you imagine the pain in the ass of trying to refine iron or steel in zero gravity?  Do we even have good materials for enclosing a smelting process to keep the molten metal from going everywhere?

refining steel in zero-g would be silly since you need to provide the carbon. Getting the other metals... Might be doable if you can separate them from each other based on the weight their atoms have. But getting to that point though seems quite impracticle, if not impossible, with today's tech.