Asteroid Mining Takes A Giant Leap Forward --"Launches New Space Era"

 

          

Planetary Resources, Inc., the asteroid mining company, has announced an agreement with Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic's "LauncherOne” (above) to provide launch capability for the Arkyd series of robotic low-Earth orbit (LEO) space telescopes for the exploration and commercial development of Near-Earth Asteroids. LauncherOne uses the WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft to launch an orbital booster which delivers about 225 Kg to Low Earth Orbit (LEO). That’s enough payload to launch about 8 Arkyd-100 satellites.

“While the Arkyd spacecraft line itself radically reduces the traditional cost of exploring the NEAs, the less expensive the cost to launch an Arkyd spacecraft to LEO, the more spacecraft the company will launch. The more spacecraft that the company launches, the faster it will create a future where access to asteroid resources results in a vast network of propellant depots throughout space and a future where once precious and rare materials are abundant for all. This will enable humanity’s prosperity to continue for centuries to come,” said Eric Anderson, Co-Founder & Co-Chairman of Planetary Resources, Inc.

Of the nearly 10,000 known NEAs, there are more than 1,500 that are energetically as easy to reach as the Moon. In the next few years, constellations of Arkyd-100 Series space telescopes will help fulfill the company’s early objective of identifying additional energetically-optimal, highly-valuable NEAs which will then be added to the detailed list of the company’s prospecting targets and pursued for future potential resource extraction.

Virgin Galactic, headquartered in Las Cruces, New Mexico, is best known for its plans to ferry paying tourists to the edge of space. The ”LauncherOne” is an unmanned rocket will be air-launched by SpaceShipTwo’s carrier aircraft, WhiteKnightTwo, will be capable of delivering as much as 225 kg to low Earth Orbit.

“We are developing the LauncherOne to deliver small satellites to LEO in a reliable fashion, with the capability to fly dozens of times per year. LauncherOne leverages our work in the area of commercial human spaceflight, and will provide reliable, regular launch opportunities to enable Planetary Resources to explore and develop valuable resources from asteroids,” said George Whitesides, President and CEO of Virgin Galactic.

“As Planetary Resources works to expand humanity’s resource base, we also plan to increase scientific and commercial access to the Earth and deep space by developing capable and cost-efficient spacecraft. Interest in using our Arkyd-100 Series for commercial purposes – in addition to finding asteroids – has been very strong,” added Chris Lewicki, President and Chief Engineer of Planetary Resources, Inc.

Planetary Resources, Inc., the asteroid mining company, was founded in 2009 by Eric Anderson and Peter H. Diamandis, to establish a new paradigm for resource utilization that will bring the solar system within humanity’s economic sphere of influence.  

Planetary Resources is financed by industry-launching visionaries, three of whom include Google’s CEO Larry Page & Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt and Ross Perot, Jr., Chairman of Hillwood and The Perot Group, who are committed to expanding the world’s resource base so that humanity can continue to grow and prosper.  

Some of the company’s advisors include film maker and explorer James Cameron and Sara Seager, an astrophysicist and planetary scientist at MIT.

The Daily Galaxy via http://www.planetaryresources.com

Comments

[haha]

"This will enable humanity’s prosperity to continue for centuries to come"

Really wish they had used the word productivity there. I thought we were on the verge of moving past profit after the mess weve all made this last few centuries.

Big ideas by small minds. Got to be trouble

[taylormade irons]

Good post, I thought we were on the verge of moving past profit after the mess weve all made this last few centuries.

[MT C]

"“While the Arkyd spacecraft line itself radically reduces the traditional cost of exploring the NEAs, the less expensive the cost to launch an Arkyd spacecraft to LEO, the more spacecraft the company will launch. The more spacecraft that the company launches, the faster it will create a future where access to asteroid resources results in a vast network of propellant depots throughout space and a future where once precious and rare materials are abundant for all. This will enable humanity’s prosperity to continue for centuries to come,” said Eric Anderson, Co-Founder & Co-Chairman of Planetary Resources, Inc. "

I would have to disagree, Mr Anderson as I think it will continue to concentrate wealth to just the few. Like yourself, for instance, without benefiting but a very few more. That's how economics works, for the few.

[Bruce]

Can we all say solar-flared Dead ASTRONAUTS?

[Mike]

Asteroid Mining Takes A Giant Leap Forward --"Launches New Space Era" No it doesn't , how many asteroids have the mined , ? Answer none , how will they mine an asteroid and get even I kilo back to earth Answer They haven't got a clue ! Editor's Comment: Looking at the pedigree of the backers of this venture, it's obvious who doesn't have a clue.

[Zathras]

@haha:

"I thought we were on the verge of moving past profit after the mess we[']ve all made this last few centuries."

Spoken like someone who has never succeeded, and wishing otherwise.

Profit is merely the difference between revenue and the cost of making a product or providing a service, measured in money. There's nothing magic about it. The successful never perceive profit to be an end in itself, otherwise, they fail.

Contrariwise, I like to think humanity is finally moving past the savage mystics of envy into a prosperous future where men pursuing profitable enterprises are celebrated, free from small-minded pettiness and government coercion.

@MT C:

I expect to be among "the few" benefiting from cheaper resources; don't you? The few benefit from automobiles, airplanes, television, computers, cell phones, heating and cooling on demand, food literally everywhere, etc. But, I guess you're right, only a few billion benefit from those things, and in spite of a dark-ages mentality dominating its culture, only a small few manage to eke out a living and scrape by, into their eighties. If only those few would bestow upon us some small crumb, some tiny tidbit, just a minuscule morsel, then, we the humble masses, could dare think it possible, maybe, just maybe, to share in their benefits.

I am saddened by this, the current fashion of petulance and ingratitude (now drenched in melodrama), intruding onto a science news website.

Prosperity is all around us my friends.

[Lee]

The sun always shines somewhere on the British Empire, We shall see? Glass-Steagal

[FireflyMal]

I applaud Planetary Resources, Inc. and Virgin Galactic for their vision.

Sadly, however, some who comment here are struck blind by their own ignorance.

Small minds: haha, taylormade irons, and MT C ... sad hypocrites blindly posting nonsense via for-profit corporately developed products (i.e. computer & internet).

Consider the idiocy these petulant envy driven gnats propose: let’s eliminate profit … of course the only way to do so is to instill a dictatorial regime, shackle freedom and creativity, eliminate choice … and focus on “productivity”…

How shall we proceed?

Perhaps we can follow in the footsteps of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Kim Jong-il … all leaders who focused on “productivity”… while hundreds of millions led wretched lives in staggering poverty for generations as a direct consequence of their policies. (Never mind the stinking piles of bodies, the killing fields, and mass graves …).

Because the only possible way to constrain producers, the free masses who enjoy an abundance of low cost goods, the free market, and the creative visionaries who produce those things which benefit all, is to enslave them -- and murder any who have the wit to speak out in protest.

In the free nations of the industrialized world an abundance of low cost goods flood markets – benefiting low and middle income earners and even the most impoverished.

Or perhaps haha, taylormade irons, and MT C misspoke, and really meant “efficiency” rather than productivity? I believe the Nazi’s had a few ideas along those lines …

[Patrick Donnelly]

Very positive!

We have more beings alive today than ever before and more than have lived before! Yeah! We are doing well.

People like these will succeed. It will not be easy, but it will be fun and profitable after an ocean of resources are poured in! Small is good here.

We will have self replicating robots soon, capable of disassembling an asteroid or tunnelling into one and converting it to a solar storm proof habitation and work platform. Some people live to work. Strap on ion engines and we have genuine space exploration!

Bringing stuff to earth is pointless. It is far cheaper to mine earth. Keep that stuff in space and make it the multiplier for our future!

[Zathras]

Mining asteroids for resources and hauling it all back to Earth may indeed prove, in the short term, more expensive than Earth-bound mining as Patrick suggests. Planetary Resources, and its investors, seem to think otherwise and are willing to risk their own time and their own money in the enterprise. One question needing voice though, Cheaper for who? Cheaper for those in the business of buying resources, no? If Planetary Resources can't find a buyer, well then, I guess, yes, the entire effort would be pointless. But, that is neither for me to decide, nor to dictate.

Planetary Resources and others seem to think, with conviction, that there are precious and rare materials on those asteroids; rare materials having an increasing number of political obstacles to get at here on Earth.

According to Eric Anderson, Planetary Resources intends, through its deal with Virgin Galactic, to put "constellations of Arkyd-100 Series space telescopes" in orbit to find candidate asteroids. Couldn't those telescopes be re-purposed for the business of spotting asteroids in danger of hitting the Earth? Sounds like something some people might want to pay money for. In addition, Anderson suggests a "vast network of propellant depots throughout space." Nothing like a gas station when you need one.

After sixty years of the baby-steps taken by NASA (not meant to diminish their achievements), I am now anxious to witness the development of man walking in space.

[Paul]

Seems like building processing centers on the moon would be easier and cheaper in the long run than hauling ores back to earth, or a processing factory on the asteroid itself. The thing that is really needed if we are going to be successful in ventures like this is a way to come and go from earth with something much larger than a glorified tin can. We should not have to land with parachutes after a firey re entry. I guess it will take 100 years to develope this technology.

[John Bull]

Mining asteroids for precious metals, how likely is that?

This is so obviously a complete fantasy, fit only for science fiction stories, that I am surprised any rational person can take it seriously...

...it would cost $17 million per gram just to get raw material back from an asteroid (based on NASA mission OSIRIS-REx).
Is there any chance that the cost of space flight could be reduced by the factors of millions necessary to bring raw ore back for processing? Of course not. So the ore processing would have to be done up in space and refined metal brought back - and you still have to reduce the cost of space flight by many orders of magnitude to make it profitable. Yet there are limits to how much the cost of technology can be reduced. The cost of compliance with the ever-increasing burden of standards tends to increase, and will accelerate as the inevitable accidents occur in a high-risk activity. Who is going to take on the burden of insurance for the commercial operations?...

Has precious metal ever been found on an asteroid?... they are mostly worthless rock (silicates, olivine, pyroxene, feldspar, carbonaceous chondrite) or lumps of nickel-iron...

According to Alvarez et al., in "Extraterrestrial cause for the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary extinction" (1980), platinum-group metals can be significantly more abundant in meteorites than they are in rocks in the Earth's crust, at about 500 nanograms/gram of meteorite... = 0.5 g/tonne
Cut-off (minimum) grades of 1 to 4.8 g/tonne are used by the Anglo-American company...
if the space ore at best is half the minimum profitable grade compatible with the costs of processing on Earth what are the chances that with all the added costs of space transport it will ever be profitable in space?

Any discovery of a massive lump of high grade platinum floating around out there, if it were possible to bring it back, would probably lower the price of platinum so much as to nullify any profit obtainable - even though as discussed, it's not even likely to be profitable at today's price!

Therefore it seems to me that mining asteroids for precious metals is about as realistic as the moon being made of cheese or there being fertile canal systems on Mars.

What this is more likely to be about, it seems to me, is a way of persuading backers to sink money into an extremely speculative venture that will keep a few space fanatics busy and in pocket for a number of years...

More details: http://pmstandard.prophpbb.com/topic62.html