Platinium is far from the most valuable material that can be mined in space Iridium is worth far more to terrestrial civilisation because you can use iridium to create artificial photosynthesis and remove atmospheric CO2 from the atmosphere and turn it into fuel .How would anyone like a panel on their roof that makes fuel that they can put in their car or heat their house for free ?
Quote from: floss on 04/06/2017 08:03 pmPlatinium is far from the most valuable material that can be mined in space Iridium is worth far more to terrestrial civilisation because you can use iridium to create artificial photosynthesis and remove atmospheric CO2 from the atmosphere and turn it into fuel .How would anyone like a panel on their roof that makes fuel that they can put in their car or heat their house for free ?{citation needed}
Quote from: incoming on 04/06/2017 05:48 pmUnderstanding the demand side of the equation could go a long way to determining the threshold amount for "crashing" the market. Yes, the demand curve will be key. I did some fooling around with the (linear) demand curve seemingly implied by the 2014 Pt strike (where a 20% reduction in supply caused an apparent 10% spike in prices), and I get a formula of:P = -0.115384615 * Q + 45,000where P is the price in $/kg, and Q is total annual production in kilograms per year. (For present prices I'm assuming $30K/kg and 130,000 kg of produced Pt.)I got some interesting results: once production causes the price to decline below $22.5K/kg (25% less than current prices), total revenue starts going down. So the optimal price point is $22.5K/kg, with a total production of 195 mT, and total revenue of $4.4B, compared to total revenues today of approximately $3.9B. Thus, to do the predatory pricing strategy, assuming a 50% price reduction would do the trick, they would have to double the total production, and their revenues at that point would still be $3.9B. As for the benefit to society, at the optimal point, the consumer surplus per year would be about $1.2B (that is, money freed up that can be spent on other things). If they kept the price at $15K/kg (50% of today's price), then the consumer surplus would be nearly $3B/year.
Understanding the demand side of the equation could go a long way to determining the threshold amount for "crashing" the market.
Demand for $1 per gram of platinum doesn't look like that, at all.
I found this calculator for constructing a curve of the form y = (ax + c)/(x - b) that has the general shape you're looking for. It matches the 3 points to within tiny fractions of a percent.http://www.had2know.com/academics/rational-function-regression-calculator.html
Quote from: Warren Platts on 04/07/2017 04:59 pmI found this calculator for constructing a curve of the form y = (ax + c)/(x - b) that has the general shape you're looking for. It matches the 3 points to within tiny fractions of a percent.http://www.had2know.com/academics/rational-function-regression-calculator.htmlWolframAlpha does that pretty well too, btwhttp://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=logarithmic+fit+%7B104,+33%7D,+%7B130,+30%7D,+%7B22750,+0.5%7DOr if you want widget: http://www.wolframalpha.com/widgets/view.jsp?id=a96a9e81ac4bbb54f8002bb61b8d3472
A lot of hot air if you ask me.
I think predictions of asteroid mining crashing markets are a bit premature. Once you capture that amazing shiny rock, you still need to process it and transport it. None of that is going to be free or fast.
Actually, there is reason to believe the costs of production could be radically lower. The cost of "mining" the asteroid is really mainly the cost of moving the object to Earth orbit. Once there, since it's mostly metal, slabs of the asteroid could be fed directly into an electric arc blast furnace. This is A LOT easier than trying to beneficiate ore. The thing is, the "slag" that would result is basically nature's own Inconel steel, which is the best steel known to mankind. You could then use this to manufacture satellites and other structures for use in space. The deadweight value of these items would be equal to the cost it would take to launch the same mass from Earth's surface. Basically, the value of the steel would be the per kg launch costs. Thus enough steel to build a structure with twice the mass of the ISS (~500 mT), and if launch costs are $10K/kg, then the value added would be worth ~$10B right there. If Pt is at 100 ppm concentration (which is extremely high), after producing 1,000 tonnes of steel, you'd have a paltry 0.1 tonnes of Pt.Flipping that around, if you produced the optimal amount of Pt (~200 mT sold for $4.5B), the excess steel would be 2 million tonnes--enough to build 4,000 ISS's. At 10K/kg, that's worth $20 trillion; that is equal to the US GDP. Bottom Line: it's quite clear that platinum is wagging the dog when it comes to mining iron asteroids.
.. I've just never seen a compelling business case where bringing large amounts of space resources down to Earth makes much sense ...
I think there's another point embedded here that always seems to materialize whenever I look at these types of analyses - space resources can absolutely be viable economically...as long as you are planning to use them in space. I've just never seen a compelling business case where bringing large amounts of space resources down to Earth makes much sense without large "and then a miracle happens" speculative leaps.
Which is interesting, because harvesting space resources is often cited as a rationale for increased activity in space (most often, in support of a moon base). See the circular logic?
Doesn't the idea that extra Platinum will crash the market assume that there won't be new uses for Platinum once the price drops?I've heard Aluminium used as a analogy for something that was once expensive and rare.Platinum, Palladium, Iridium are all metals that would be really useful in wider applications if they were less expensive and less rare.
Quote from: incoming on 04/11/2017 08:47 pmI think there's another point embedded here that always seems to materialize whenever I look at these types of analyses - space resources can absolutely be viable economically...as long as you are planning to use them in space. I've just never seen a compelling business case where bringing large amounts of space resources down to Earth makes much sense without large "and then a miracle happens" speculative leaps.While I generally agree, and I prefer to focus on volatiles for use in space, PGMs are valuable enough that they are on the cusp of viable.Quote from: incoming on 04/11/2017 08:47 pmWhich is interesting, because harvesting space resources is often cited as a rationale for increased activity in space (most often, in support of a moon base). See the circular logic?It's not circular. If you have an industry that extracts resources for use in space (such as fuel), you lower the price for other activities (such as PGM mining). If you have a market for asteroid-mined PGMs, then you have the basic infrastructure necessary to extract other resources for use in space. It doesn't matter which comes first, it one is viable, it makes the other more viable. Once regular mining is established, the "waste" from one process becomes cheap enough that you might as well bring it back to Earth (such as nickel), even though it would never have justified the creation of the necessary infrastructure on its own. Likewise, bulk materials left over from other processing may end up cheap enough that they can substitute for bulk material (aluminium tanks, shielding, trusses, etc) that would otherwise be brought from Earth.It's about self-reinforcing development. Not a circle, but a spiral.