Planetary Resources

[go4mars]

http://spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=41702

Interesting.  Some quotes:

Spacecraft Payload: Mass: ~75 kg Volume: ~0.5 cubic meters Power: <500 W Field of View: 9 degrees x 9 degrees
 
Observation Requirement: Minimum size, brightness: Able to detect an object as small as 30 meters, or 26 Absolute Magnitude (H) Object Distance from Earth: Capable of detecting objects up to 0.5 AU from Earth Astrometric Precision: <0.5"
 
The instrument development and testing, integration and accommodation, and five years of flight operations and data processing should total no more than $50M (in FY12 dollars) life cycle costs.

[thydusk666]

Now hiring Asteroid Miners

Hi ,

Do you want to be an Asteroid Miner?

Well, here's your chance!

We're looking for passionate college students for
paid coop positions to help us mine asteroids
this spring and summer...
 
If you love space and want to contribute directly to
the development of the next generation of space
exploration technologies, we want to hear from you
(or from anyone you know that you think would be
interested).
 
==> Click here to apply today!
http://planetaryresources.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=86e5e3fd66ecbdeda82b09373&id=2ea1829c27&e=ee762b96cf

Yours in space exploration,
Chris Lewicki
President & Chief Asteroid Miner
Planetary Resources, Inc.

[BrightLight]

It looks like the Sentinel project from B612 is going forward, take a look at
"Video: TEDxMarin Talk by Ed Lu: B612 Foundation Sentinel Asteroid Hunting Mission"
found at
http://onorbit.com/

Some statements from Ed Lu:
"Change the evolution of the solar system" - not too bad!
LV is from SpaceX,
2018 target launch date,
the spacecraft will weigh 2630 lbs,
cost is roughly $300M,
IR sensor (My guess is its a Telydyne Imaging mid wave IR focal plane, something like 16 M pixels),
expect to find 10,000 asteroids per month.

[Danderman]

What happened to these guys? Do they have an office somewhere?

[Robotbeat]

What happened to these guys? Do they have an office somewhere?

Yes.

[kirghizstan]

What happened to these guys? Do they have an office somewhere?

Yes.

would you like to elaborate a bit on that?

[Finn]

Analysis of Planetary Resources' (potential) business model at The Register:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/24/planetary_resources/

In short, it doesn't make any sense.

[mrmandias]

Analysis of Planetary Resources' (potential) business model at The Register:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/24/planetary_resources/

In short, it doesn't make any sense.

That's an analysis of one of their long-term business models (the other is selling volatiles to NASA or the Chinese or anyone else in orbit who might require them.  If cheap access to space happens, the metals mining becomes more feasible, whereas if it doesn't, the volatiles market becomes more likely).  As far as that analysis goes, I think its mostly correct.  Yes, the platinum market will crash if you bring back too much platinum or other metals to Earth.  Yes, its probable that in such a crash would cause real difficulties for the company that owned all the platinum and that the market would take a long time to economically adjust.  But there's a lot of express and implied supposition there about future market conditions and technologies, and the reason there's a lot of supposition about that stuff is that in business terms all of that is in the distant future, even if you accept Planetary Resource's own optimistic timetable.

The real business model here is the one pioneered by SpaceX: have an actual business model that makes sense (in Planetary Resources case, the Arkadys) but tie it to a long-term vision that inspires your employees and directors, helps some investors accept more risk than they might otherwise, gives you something to do with unused resources, and earns you publicity and outside boosters.  Whether that business model works or not is something an earthside mining expert won't know.

[JohnFornaro]

Isn't it exciting that Planetary Resources is going to jet off and mine the asteroids?

"Jet off"?  Don'cha love journalists?

If it turns out that we are able to bring back many times of the PGMs that are now used annually here, then we can create a situation of abundance. In this case, if the metals become a 100 times cheaper, then perhaps there will be annual sales quantities will be a thousand larger therefore both the market size of PGMs and their value to society will have gone up by a factor of 10.

Unfortunately, this is a facile assertion.  Keynes' comment, "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay liquid", is true, but this irrationality, I think, cannot be predicted.

But there is no concept of private property.

A pesky detail which is not really discussed in official public channels.  The current setup is first come, first served, but does not address the second coming, as it were.

Perhaps, whether PRI's partially suggested business model works or not is "something an earthside mining expert won't know", but that doesn't exclude the model's need to comply with commonly understood and proven business realities.

[Garrett]

Analysis of Planetary Resources' (potential) business model at The Register:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/24/planetary_resources/

In short, it doesn't make any sense.

I think the reporter from The Register has got it in his head that Planetary Resources' only business model is to bring back platinum and sell it at $15/once in the short to medium term (10-15 years). But that's not their business model. It's only a small part, though it's probably the part that gets the most media attention.

Their business model involves selling science data, mining water for in-space missions, mining volatiles for in-space missions, and probably many other things that they're keeping to themselves. The mining of precious metals will probably only be possible once all those other objectives have been met.

There is an historical precedent for the case where a precious metal becomes abundant and subsequently much cheaper: aluminium (or aluminum in American English). I'm pretty sure that there are still profits being made in the aluminium industry, despite aluminium having lost its status as the most precious of metals.

[Warren Platts]

Well, using Anderson's own figures, if the market $$$-wise increased by a factor of 10 and kilogram-wise by a factor of 1000, resulting in a per kilogram price drop by a factor of 100, they would have to mine and ship to Planet Earth 250,000 mT of Pt worth $500/kg for a total gross of $125B/year. Assuming a 50 ppm concentration, that would require processing 5 billion tonnes of asteroid material. Thus, one year's supply could be met by a single 1-km diameter asteroid.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

Well, using Anderson's own figures, if the market $$$-wise increased by a factor of 10 and kilogram-wise by a factor of 1000, resulting in a per kilogram price drop by a factor of 100, they would have to mine and ship to Planet Earth 250,000 mT of Pt worth $500/kg for a total gross of $125B/year. Assuming a 50 ppm concentration, that would require processing 5 billion tonnes of asteroid material. Thus, one year's supply could be met by a single 1-km diameter asteroid.

An PGM asteriod has ~20% water content if you can extract the PGM you can also get the water. At a price of $1/kg for water thats $1T in water from the same asteriod. Can you imagine a $10/kg price for propelent (cost and profit of $9/kg for cracking the water into LOX/LH2) at EML1/2 and what that would mean for space idustrialization and solar system exploration? At 30% profit on propelant sales of 1,000,000,000mt of propelant a year results in $3T in profits.

I doubt if you could process that much material in 1 year even 50 or 100 years from now. A PMF for a fast Mars transport of .95 means you could transport to Mars 50,000,000mt every year. A PMF of .95 means a delta V of ~ 13,300m/s.

P.S Transport cost due to propelant cost of $10/kg at EML1/2 would be ~$200/kg or a person with bagage totaling 1mt would be $200,000 for the trip.

[Warren Platts]

An PGM asteriod has ~20% water content if you can extract the PGM you can also get the water.

Um, that part is a bit of a problem. The PGM asteroids are thought to be remants of the metallic cores of pulverized planitesimals, whereas the water bearing asteroids are of the CI type, which are probably leftover comet fragments. But maybe you could scrape together enough silicates to roast some O2 and then get some aluminum and make ALLOX rockets, or even O2/Fe rockets...

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

An PGM asteriod has ~20% water content if you can extract the PGM you can also get the water.

Um, that part is a bit of a problem. The PGM asteroids are thought to be remants of the metallic cores of pulverized planitesimals, whereas the water bearing asteroids are of the CI type, which are probably leftover comet fragments. But maybe you could scrape together enough silicates to roast some O2 and then get some aluminum and make ALLOX rockets, or even O2/Fe rockets...

Ok, even if I have my asteriod types mixed up my point was you can make a lot more money from water than PGM with the same size asteriod and the costs to mine and extract.

[HIP2BSQRE]

Well, using Anderson's own figures, if the market $$$-wise increased by a factor of 10 and kilogram-wise by a factor of 1000, resulting in a per kilogram price drop by a factor of 100, they would have to mine and ship to Planet Earth 250,000 mT of Pt worth $500/kg for a total gross of $125B/year. Assuming a 50 ppm concentration, that would require processing 5 billion tonnes of asteroid material. Thus, one year's supply could be met by a single 1-km diameter asteroid.

An PGM asteriod has ~20% water content if you can extract the PGM you can also get the water. At a price of $1/kg for water thats $1T in water from the same asteriod. Can you imagine a $10/kg price for propelent (cost and profit of $9/kg for cracking the water into LOX/LH2) at EML1/2 and what that would mean for space idustrialization and solar system exploration? At 30% profit on propelant sales of 1,000,000,000mt of propelant a year results in $3T in profits.

I doubt if you could process that much material in 1 year even 50 or 100 years from now. A PMF for a fast Mars transport of .95 means you could transport to Mars 50,000,000mt every year. A PMF of .95 means a delta V of ~ 13,300m/s.

P.S Transport cost due to propelant cost of $10/kg at EML1/2 would be ~$200/kg or a person with bagage totaling 1mt would be $200,000 for the trip.

There is one question who has $1t?  If water was that cheap at L2 who would buy it?  There may be billions of tons of ice in the arctic but how many people are lining their stores to buy propellent?  The question is where is the demand?

[guckyfan]

There is one question who has $1t?  If water was that cheap at L2 who would buy it?  There may be billions of tons of ice in the arctic but how many people are lining their stores to buy propellent?  The question is where is the demand?

My questions would be quite different.

1. How do you get such an asteroid into L2?

Once you have it there and assuming Phobos is such a thing in Low Mars Orbit, you would have cheap and plentiful LOX and LH on both ends. That would facilitate transport between Earth and Mars.

2. Can you build a fully and rapidly reusable system with LH? It is my opinion that LH engines will not be rapidly reusable. I might be wrong there and the storage problem can be solved with the incentive of cheap fuel.

[JohnFornaro]

Well, using Anderson's own figures, if the market $$$-wise increased by a factor of 10 and kilogram-wise by a factor of 1000, resulting in a per kilogram price drop by a factor of 100, they would have to mine and ship to Planet Earth 250,000 mT of Pt worth $500/kg for a total gross of $125B/year. Assuming a 50 ppm concentration, that would require processing 5 billion tonnes of asteroid material. Thus, one year's supply could be met by a single 1-km diameter asteroid.

An PGM asteriod has ~20% water content if you can extract the PGM you can also get the water. At a price of $1/kg for water thats $1T in water from the same asteriod. Can you imagine a $10/kg price for propelent (cost and profit of $9/kg for cracking the water into LOX/LH2) at EML1/2 and what that would mean for space idustrialization and solar system exploration? At 30% profit on propelant sales of 1,000,000,000mt of propelant a year results in $3T in profits.

Your $10/kg price for propellant is unrealistic.  Did I miss a number of zeros along the way?

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

Well, using Anderson's own figures, if the market $$$-wise increased by a factor of 10 and kilogram-wise by a factor of 1000, resulting in a per kilogram price drop by a factor of 100, they would have to mine and ship to Planet Earth 250,000 mT of Pt worth $500/kg for a total gross of $125B/year. Assuming a 50 ppm concentration, that would require processing 5 billion tonnes of asteroid material. Thus, one year's supply could be met by a single 1-km diameter asteroid.

An PGM asteriod has ~20% water content if you can extract the PGM you can also get the water. At a price of $1/kg for water thats $1T in water from the same asteriod. Can you imagine a $10/kg price for propelent (cost and profit of $9/kg for cracking the water into LOX/LH2) at EML1/2 and what that would mean for space idustrialization and solar system exploration? At 30% profit on propelant sales of 1,000,000,000mt of propelant a year results in $3T in profits.

Your $10/kg price for propellant is unrealistic.  Did I miss a number of zeros along the way?

My numbers were just a comparison of the fact that you can make 8 times the profit on water with a ridiculusly low low price for water than what you can with PGM. There are practically no case where profits from water will be significantly less than those from PGM. PGM's will be a byproduct of of processing the asteriod for the most significant quantity material "water". Even the PGM poor LL chrondite which is the most common asteriod has 1/5 the PGM concentration of the best PGM source asteriod. PGM's produced as a byproduct can be used along with the Silicon, alluminum and titanium to produce large solar cell arrays. One of the items associated with PGM's is silver which makes a good conductor. Gold is also present but at very small quantities.

My point is the primary money maker and driver of the technologies developed is the water and secondary is the capability to use the other items to manufacture solar arrays and other structures, as well as slag for use as radiation shielding. It will be a long time before launch costs from Earth force drops in the price of materials in orbit. As long as the value of slag in orbit is high >$100/kg then pratically nothing would be shipped to Earth since it is more valuable in orbit than on Earth.

(Edit - clarity and spelling)
Excuse me its Au "gold" that is significant at 4.4ppm not silver in a LL Chrondite with Pt at 30ppm.

[JohnFornaro]

My numbers were just a comparison of the fact that you can make 8 times the profit on water with a ridiculusly low low price for water than what you can with PGM.

Ahhhh... Gotcha.

[oldAtlas_Eguy]

Considering the asteroids in entirety, there is ~1000x more water than there is PGM by weight and ~4000x more water than Pt.

http://www.uapress.arizona.edu/onlinebks/ResourcesNearEarthSpace/resources20.pdf