/sci/ - Science & Math

>>3986561
Many of these would be incredibly useful in inventions and processes if they became almost worthless. Aluminium has completely revolutionized how we build many products and structures, but only about a hundred years ago this was not so.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium#History
>Before the Hall-Héroult process was developed in the late 1880s, aluminium was exceedingly difficult to extract from its various ores. This made pure aluminium more valuable than gold.[46] Bars of aluminium were exhibited at the Exposition Universelle of 1855.[47] Napoleon III, Emperor of France, is reputed to have given a banquet where the most honoured guests were given aluminium utensils, while the others made do with gold.[48][49]

So yes, we do need that much metal. Not to mention that rare Earth elements (REEs) are far more abundant in asteroids than the Earth's crust. When Earth coalesced from its primordial molten pile of asteroids, the heavier elements sank toward the core. It's only because of the Late Heavy Bombardment that stuff like gold is 10,000 times more abundant than it should be.

>>3959745
Neodymium is expensive because China has so far been mining 97% of the world's rare earth minerals. Neodymium is almost always found with Thorium. It's just not cheap enough. We need undersea mineral mining and asteroid mining to make neodymium cheaper than iron is today.

>>3946080
I am a huge fan of space-based solar but that simply won't work. You need an autonomous system that churns low-efficiency solar panels from asteroid regolith with very little payload launched from Earth if you ever want this proposal to be viable. Got to wait at least 10 years mang.

>>3922290
I really need to save what I type every time I suggest my plan for feasible, profitable asteroid mining. It goes like this:
- One rocket is fitted with about 50 compact, simple mining robots. Then about 6 bigger construction robots. And an unfoldable mass driver. Another rocket is fitted with a small portable LFTR and a plasma gasification unit, molds for simple, bulky robot and product parts (molds for wheel, chassis, mass drivers, and so on.) as well as about 150 or so circuit-boards for robots, as well as any lightweight components that are too intricate to create in orbit such as sensors, and some spare propellant. It sets off for some metal-rich asteroid.
- When it arrives, the LFTR is deployed, the construction robots set up the plasma gasification unit to connect to the LFTR, and mining robots go off to just pick away at rock. This rock is then carried back to the plasma gasification unit, where electricity from the LFTR is used to heat the temperature inside to about 14,000'C, which disassociates everything into its constituent elemental gases. These are then centrifuged and separated to be either in the collection tray to be launched as payload to Earth via mass driver, or to be poured in the molds for extra robot parts. Begin assembling more robots with the components you brought along. Any payloads you wish to send back to Earth get excess iron/nickel melted over it (as a makeshift heat shield) and some primitive thrusters to adjust approach into a designated impact site (Somewhere in a desert) where it can be collected and resold.
- If you want to mine the asteroid faster, just ship up another rocket with a thousand circuit-boards and sensors. It might be feasible to even launch small constructed LFTRs/PGUs and robots to other asteroids via mass drive to basically have a Von Neumann machine for mining the solar system.

The mining of rare earth elements in asteroids for the development of space-based solar is very sustainable (Warning:Mayrequiretechnologynotavailableuntil2020.)

>>3685576
I would say that if it were to increase demand a lot, it would increase the price.

>>3685581
Well anyway my point was for much of human history Aluminium has been incredibly scarce and expensive.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium#History

>Aluminium was selected as the material to be used for the 100 ounce (2.8 kg) capstone of the Washington Monument in 1884, a time when one ounce (30 grams) cost the daily wage of a common worker on the project;[51] The capstone, which was set in place on December 6, 1884, in an elaborate dedication ceremony, was the largest single piece of aluminium cast at the time, when aluminium was as expensive as silver.[52]

Since aluminium has become abundant countless processes in manufacturing and so on have used large quantities of it, only improving the standard of living and creating more options for affordable, profitable inventions that perhaps might not be able to run or achieve that much market penetration if they had been drastically higher in price.

Gold and platinum, along with other rare earth metals are also widely used in semiconductors and many other modern electronics, which would greatly benefit with a drop in price if such metals were to become ubiquitous and plentiful. Fuck people outfitted with 'bling' or the people that cling onto the BUY GOLD hype. If they don't start selling the second an asteroid mining venture looks like it will really happen, then it is a case of survival of the fittest. Some people lose their wealth and the entire world gains more than they could've had.

>>3661123
If you have simple multi-material 3D printers that can replicate themselves out of purified asteroid elements (which can be done with a plasma gasification unit) you can do it for peanuts. All you need is something that mines asteroid rubble, transports it to the plasma gasification unit, it centrifuges the vapourised elements apart from each other, and then most of those metals are fired through a mass driver back home for either collection in LEO, or a designated impact site (somewhere in some remote desert) could be used for landing the materials directly.

Earth-based solar has a few major pitfalls:
Baseload power: For about 12 hours, no sunlight. Batteries to store excess energy are impractical.
Weather: Clouds fuck your shit up, yo
Location: It would be nice if everywhere got the same energy as the Sahara. Unfortunately most of civilization seems to be located around the 40 degree latitude mark.

With space-based solar, the benefits are grand. Since there is no atmosphere, the panels receive 4 to 10 times more power than Earth-based ones do. No weather either. Since the panels are in geosynchronous orbit they stay direct sunlight 99% of the time.
And the transmission of electricity to the surface can be done with microwaves that interact with the atmosphere very little, making the efficiency losses about 2%.

>>3495045
*Rare* earth metals. During the formation of the Earth the metals from asteroids and planetoids sunk into the inner mantle and core, leaving the crust relatively depleted.

>>3495054
I didn't make the image.

>>3305687
>asteroid mining
>metals like gold become cheap as fuck
>plate EVERYTHING with as much gold as you wish

>>3127006
The technology:
http://techland.time.com/2011/04/06/spacexs-falcon-heavy-most-powerful-private-rocket-ever/
http://www.universetoday.com/73536/nasa-considering-rail-gun-launch-system-to-the-stars/
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article4799369.ece

The will:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8bIQLiKi3g
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2011/02/lord-british-wants-to-take-you-to-space-and-hes-closer-th
an-you-think.ars/3

The time (and one of the main kicks in the ass to get it started):
http://www.hplusmagazine.com/articles/forever-young/manhattan-beach-project-end-aging-2029
http://www.sens.org/sens-research/research-themes
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3329065877451441972#
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/101128/full/news.2010.635.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/nov/28/scientists-reverse-ageing-mice-humans

The economic benefits:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_mining
>At 1997 prices, a relatively small metallic asteroid with a diameter of 1 mile contains more than $20 trillion US dollars worth of industrial and precious metals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near_Earth_Objects#Near-Earth_asteroids
>As of May 2010, 7,075 near-Earth asteroids are known,[14] ranging in size up to ~32 kilometers (1036 Ganymed).[16] The number of near-Earth asteroids over one kilometer in diameter is estimated to be 500 - 1,000.
http://www.virgingalactic.com/

I guess this is what it would be like.