Mako11 | 04 Feb 2016 1:45 p.m. PST |
Luxembourg is all in on the space mining race, so it looks like the Traveller RPG is about to become reality, in the next decade or two, with any luck. link Turns out some of those asteroids are believed to be worth trillions of dollars, so people are lining up to go after them. I'm guessing it will be difficult, dirty work, fraught with peril. Watch the movie "Outland", for a rough idea of what miner's lives will be like, assuming they are lucky. Another interesting movie is "Moon", which has an interesting twist in it. |
Tgerritsen | 04 Feb 2016 2:17 p.m. PST |
Don't blow your muster out roll! |
Waco Joe | 04 Feb 2016 2:18 p.m. PST |
I am curious to see the economics play out on this. Unobtainium is valuable because it is rare on Earth. A huge asteroid is made of unobtainium. Do the companies have the self control to send only a little back at a time, thereby keeping the price high? Or do they try to make back the huge capital investment in getting to the asteroid and send as much back as they can, seriously depressing the price? |
Mako11 | 04 Feb 2016 2:22 p.m. PST |
I suspect the prices will plummet rather quickly, since with precious materials, who has ever really exercised my control for long? Of course, people will be fighting over it, so space piracy will occur rather quickly too. |
Col Durnford | 04 Feb 2016 2:33 p.m. PST |
"try to make back the huge capital investment in getting to the asteroid and send as much back as they can" Let's just bring the whole asteroid closer to Earth. What could go wrong with that? |
Saber6 | 04 Feb 2016 2:39 p.m. PST |
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Covert Walrus | 04 Feb 2016 2:42 p.m. PST |
In all seriousness, there are rare minerals that might be found in asteroids that wouldn't be likely to depress a market by being brought back to Earth. Lithium is not plentiful, but it's extraction costs keeps it fairly cheap – It is however so necessary to battery technology for many devices and possibly for future ones ( Electric cars ) that the world's supply with still be used up quickly. |
Dervel | 04 Feb 2016 2:45 p.m. PST |
Interesting…. been watching the Expanse on SyFy. |
ubercommando | 04 Feb 2016 2:50 p.m. PST |
Not Traveller but another GDW game: Belter. Good game too. |
Mako11 | 04 Feb 2016 3:27 p.m. PST |
I don't know about what could go wrong, but there's one predicted to fly by as close as 11,000 miles next month, or a lot further than that (they don't have good data on it), so I guess we could find out soon. Celestial billiards anyone? |
Coyotepunc and Hatshepsuut | 04 Feb 2016 3:47 p.m. PST |
Lithium is also important to the mental health community. I'd rather see people sane than lower their carbon footprint ;_0 |
kallman | 04 Feb 2016 4:03 p.m. PST |
ubercommando thank you for mentioning the correct GDW game Belter. Loved that game. I'm guessing it will be difficult, dirty work, fraught with peril. Watch the movie "Outland", for a rough idea of what miner's lives will be like, assuming they are lucky. Another interesting movie is "Moon", which has an interesting twist in it." While yes there will be human operators going for the asteroids I image that most of the actual mining will be done with drones and remotes or outright robots. Safer, less risk to human life, and they do not need coffee or pee breaks. No unions to worry about and so forth. The potential pay off of just one mineral rich asteroid is worth the financial risk once the infrastructure is in place. The infrastructure in this case is reusable vehicles that get you into outer space, functional and reliable inter-planetary transport, again that has a long life use, and established orbital space stations and/or a base on the Moon or Mars. |
TNE2300 | 04 Feb 2016 4:54 p.m. PST |
Traveller had the Beltstrike Module and Supplement 4 added the Belter service "for a rough idea of what miner's lives will be like" read CJ CHERRYH's HEAVY TIME |
Mithmee | 04 Feb 2016 5:18 p.m. PST |
The Real Money will be in finding the best rocks. |
Sargonarhes | 04 Feb 2016 5:26 p.m. PST |
It all started with asteroid mining and orbital colonies… soon we will be dropping those colonies for the greater glory of all spacenoids, Sieg Zeon, Sieg Zeon, Sieg Zeon!
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Waco Joe | 04 Feb 2016 6:53 p.m. PST |
Saber, the diamond and gold cartels are exactly who I was thinking of in the "bring it back a little at a time" model |
Lion in the Stars | 04 Feb 2016 7:04 p.m. PST |
Considering that there was a recent ruling that mining companies had to put man and machinery on the asteroid to claim it, I can see a lot of potential for shenanigans. |
Mako11 | 05 Feb 2016 12:30 a.m. PST |
I suspect the diamond cartel would collapse now, if people knew how many there really are in the world. It's been that way for years. |
ubercommando | 05 Feb 2016 5:44 a.m. PST |
Let's not forget another sci-fi classic about mining, depressed rare gems markets and corporate exploitation of space…Moon Zero Two. |
Parzival | 06 Feb 2016 2:44 p.m. PST |
Accessibility of supply is as much if not more so an element of cost as the amount. The simple existence of an asteroid's mineral wealth wouldn't necessarily overly depress the market. The method of mining would have to be cheaper than the method on Earth for that to happen. In this case, de and would have more drive on cost than supply; the demand would have to be high enough to far exceed space mining costs, which would imply a market not at all depressed by the existence of the source. |
capncarp | 15 Feb 2016 7:06 p.m. PST |
Parzival, I half-agree with you--for the early part of the time in which a gem- or ore-rich asteroid is found. As more and more efforts are made, and the overhead cost comes down, and the possibility that there is an ENORMOUS amount of said ore for the taking in space, I believe the wise holders of terrestrial gem/ore stocks should see the writing on the wall and diversify into something else. |