@MrMatklug
with the asteroid mining dream crushed, now only the "put a railgun on the moon to deliver payload" to make moon to earth or leo very cheap, can save my space miner dream
@fergalhennessy775
you are so underrated as a channel 😭
@aldenconsolver3428
Another way of getting a small amount of platinum down to earth - break the object up into small pieces say a composite sphere with a average density of 8000 kg (using a disposable outer layer) entering a small angle to eat up as much energy as possible say 15 degrees aimed to impact into a a large body of relatively shallow water using a calculation from imperial college we may be able to land a metric ton producing a relatively small blast into the shallow water allowing the relatively easy recovery of the chunk. If this water is big enough that we can keep everything 5 km away we should be able to make money on the deal (obviously we will not be able to do this in the territorial of the US or the EU even if we can find the water body, the EPA would just take a sh*t . We could also just stack starship full of carbon fiber phenolic heat shields and do the same trick but I don't have those numbers handy. ) We could look at this also as being able to ship 3000 kg apollo heat shields in starship along with say 50 tons of deorbit fuel that would let us ship better than 30 heat shields and a metric ton of platinum in each we could actually really make money. Do you have a phone number for the plats? and for elon? And for a small time dictator who doesn't care about risks or pollution? Oh yeah, we also need to head hunt the bean counters from DeBeers. It is really handy that platinum doesn't melt until 1700C
@TheAmazingchickens
Worth bearing in mind that a system going from the asteroid belt to earth orbit doesn't have to fight gravity, with balistic capture you don't even need a high thrust capture burn, this allows for more exotic low thrust/high ISP propulsion that isn't possible for earth launchers.
@evil0sheep
Great video, but you're spending all your time dismantling the idea of mining asteroids to return the asteroids to earth, which is a concept I see a lot in pop media but not one that I've seen a lot of serious futurists discuss. The promise of deep space ISRU is not that you could compete with the price of precious metals on Earth (since as you explored this is a losing game), but rather can you supply raw materials in deep space for cheaper than it costs to lift them into orbit and get them to the markets where they can be used? Like yes mining platinum to send to earth is dumb but there are much more interesting questions you can ask. For example, if we want an extended presence on the Moon we will need tons of nitrogen and carbon to make earthlike atmospheres and to grow plants. There is no nitrogen and carbon on the moon to speak of, so how about a comparison on getting nitrogen and carbon to the lunar surface from Earth vs Mars vs Asteroids? Or if world governments get together to build a mega telescope at the Earth-Sun L2, what is the best source of the aluminum and/or iron you need to do that? Or what about the most economical source of silicon to make huge solar arrays in cislunar space? Whats the best source or thorium for nuclear reactors in LEO? Or what if we want to build an O'Neill cylinder on an Earth-Moon or Earth-Mars cycler to support space tourism and interplanetary transit, what is the best source of the raw materials you need to do that based on the cost of getting those raw materials onto the cycler orbit from wherever they come from? I think these are the kinds of questions you should be asking yourself about asteroid mining (or about lunar or martian mining) if you want to try to understand what a deep space economy would actually look like. Picking on the idea of returning space materials to earth is kindof attacking a strawman IMO.
@thomaseubank1503
Wrap a kevlar net around the asteroid, spin it until it expands, and you'll have yourself an O'Neill Cylinder.
@JoinTheNoob
The best video on this topic I've seen so far. It's what I allways guessed, but with numbers put behind it. Thanks alot!
@JayVal90
Astroid mining suffers from 2 fundamental problems. 1) we have more materials on Earth than in all of the astroid belt. 2) It’s almost certainly always going to be cheaper to dig deeper mines.
@CombinatorialImplosi
I recall reading prof. John Lewis’ book “Mining The Sky”, some years back, obviously he had a more upbeat assessment of the potential of asteroid mining than you have here. One thing he did differently than your reference missions that may account for this is that he seemed to much prefer Earth approaching asteroids. These are not only physically closer to Earth than asteroids in the main belt but, far more significantly in terms of orbital mechanics, have a much lower delta v requirement and, in particular, I recalled being stunned at how low the return delta v numbers were. As you know, it is that exponential term which makes for the tyranny of the rocket equation, but this also works in reverse. Return delta v numbers that are a fraction of the exhaust velocity of the motor you are using make it exponentially easier to move large masses as that fraction gets smaller. As an added bonus, it is Earth approaching asteroids which present the greatest hazard of impacting Earth in the near future, so utilizing one of them may make us safer, if minutely.
@aldenconsolver3428
I had a contrary opinion about this long ago. Someday when we have effective factories in space near asteroids and enough business on the outer planets and moons, hey maybe it will work.
@randomperson1827
I think you could make asteroid mining profitable if you used the starship to orbit but nuclear rockets for everything else.
@theproceedings4050
To me, the central problem with asteroid mining is that there is no current market. To be useful, there must be a demand for materials outside of a significant gravity well, and a means to make use of those materials. Asteroid materials are circumstantially valuable.
@jeric_synergy8581
If you're sending a ship up anyway, why not carry a couple satellites UP? --I think the historic name for this kind of thing is "the triangular trade", when 3 ports are involved. It's not like ships traveled around empty. Also, there's the case of aluminum: when it became cheap, we found new uses for it.
@charlesmaurer6214
Two flaws, you assume the only goal is to just return to Earth and second in the payloads your using you assume using the capsule to return product. Instead you really just need to deorbit the material to a chosen site, perhaps wrapped in a bubble of material or with an attached parachute. I would note the biggest use of space mining is to build in space instead of lifting everything to space. In time cost may come down but it is going to be more useful with colonizing Mars and orbital structures.
@cirospaciari5015
We need not only something bigger than starship, but also infrastructure and people living in asteroirds to mine and refine the metals. But starship is the start of what could enable thi, just maybe.
@thiagovanzella9911
Asteroid mining, in the near future, will only be useful if the materials are going to be used in space
@richardzeitz54
So, the more interesting conversation would be about what technologies that we already have could be developed to make asteroid mining viable. Perhaps there are other products and markets, like now that we're finding there're hydrated minerals in some asteroids, mining volatiles for use in space? And there's lots of oxygen to be had, many silicates. And perhaps a Starship might be outfitted or retrofitted in orbit to use VASMIR propulsion, to be capable of going to asterioids and coming back. We might consider extraction technologies that can't be used on Earth but which would work excellently in vacuum, in low or no gravity. I've seen figures for VASMIR of up to 5000s Isp,. Might an asteroid not provide material to use as propellant for the return? Sure this was a bit of a buzzkill, but it seemed a bit pessimistic, therefore not such a complete buzzkill. If it was optimistic in tone but still concluded asteroid mining is unlikely to work out, that would be different.
@Hailfire08
Great video! I think asteroid mining is feasible but only when we already have well-developed space infrastructure. Probably we'd be relying on nuclear engines too, since chemistry just doesn't carry all that much energy. (And not for ground-based stuff, or not until we both exhaust what little platinum there is down here, and generate so much up there that it's considered a waste product. But if you want to build a station in deep space, you might as well use the materials already there)
@mskiptr
Huh… this video made me hopeful about maybe seeing some one-off space "mining" mission this century.
@ajm2872