Company Plans to Use 'Firefly' Spaceships to Mine Asteroids for Minerals

hi all

sry if this has been posted I did a search and found nothing

Ok this is cool..it says they are gonna start prospecting in 2015.. wow thats pretty soon.. So are there asteroids made of gold?

Maybe they will find a metal better then gold..
www.usnews.com...

A company called Deep Space Industries announced Tuesday that within two years it may start sending spacecraft into the solar system with the goal of harvesting natural resources from asteroids.

Known as asteroid mining, the company says the "riches of the solar system offer humanity both unprecedented prosperity and an improved environment." The company hopes to harvest water, iron, gold, platinum and other minerals

here the live announcement for anyone interested

TextThe tiny, 55-pound, unmanned prospecting ships, called "fireflies" would be sent to observe any asteroids that passed near earth, while larger "Dragonflies" would be sent out to bring back asteroid samples. Ultimately, the company plans to send larger robot spacecraft that could harvest and return valuable minerals to earth

reply to post by goou111


How about Imagining the Life of one of those New Fangled Asteroid Miners ? Oxogen Allowence , Mileage To Work in Parsecs , and some Crazy Lame Ahass form of Obama Care for Emergencies in Da Future, it just Sounds too Frighting to me ! ...Gotta be Dang Crazy to take a Job is Space with Drawbacks like that........

Originally posted by Zanti Misfit
reply to post by goou111

 

How about Imagining the Life of one of those New Fangled Asteroid Miners ? Oxogen Allowence , Mileage To Work in Parsecs , and some Crazy Lame Ahass form of Obama Care for Emergencies in Da Future, it just Sounds too Frighting to me ! ...Gotta be Dang Crazy to take a Job is Space with Drawbacks like that........

lol.. I bet there wont be a shortage of people signing up

reply to post by goou111


Of Course Not , Remember the " Alaskan Pipeline " ? .............

Even in theory this sounds preposterous lol. Well it really sounds cool I suppose, but this is the type of project that will advance our capabilities in space, whether it succeeds or fails. We will learn quite a bit either way. Thinking about what would be needed to achieve this goal, I feel that there are so many large problems that would have to be solved first.

If they could get a payload back, since asteroids can contain quite a bit of precious metals, the capsule is gonna be extremely heavy on re-entry. That does not matter in space, so robotics could easily handle mining these large rocks, but even still it is a huge challenge. I am glad there are people attempting this, as I have heard the idea thrown around for a long time now.

This is the type of thing that is going to get us colonies on mars and the moon. Sooner than people think.
I once read that 1 asteroid could have upwards of several trillion dollars in precious metals and minerals.
Quite exciting.

Originally posted by goou111

Known as asteroid mining, the company says the "riches of the solar system offer humanity both unprecedented prosperity and an improved environment." The company hopes to harvest water, iron, gold, platinum and other minerals

So in other words, we are going to be forced to pay extreme prices for these things in the future. They have to make a profit somehow, I presume.

And I thought the rise in cost of water from our desalination plant here was bad...

Take my love, take my land
Take me where I cannot stand
I don't care, I'm still free
You can't take the sky from me
Take me out to the black
Tell them I ain't comin' back
Burn the land and boil the sea
You can't take the sky from me
There's no place I can be
Since I found Serenity
But you can't take the sky from me...

Could they not mine things here on Earth cheaper, faster, and in massive quantities compared to sending off 55 pound satellites to survey space and bring back asteroid to earth. How are they going to get the asteroid to earth? Is it going to get processed in space or on earth? How are they going to process them in space?

All I see is Excessive Costs, Excessive Risks, Excessive Stupidity.

I call it the ECERES Principal.

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reply to post by JohnnyAnonymous


awesome..

reply to post by optimus primal


Asteroids Will Oneday Actually Be " Spaceships" if Society Embraces Certain Technologies over the Long Term that could Possibly lead into a Perminate Presence in Space for Mankind...... but Good Luck with that Eh ? L5 Society , the Time has Come NOW Dispite the Possibility of an Alien Presence in Orbit Around Our Planet !.......... ........

So says my Friend " Conspiracy Hal and his Cat J. Edgar Hoover Jr. .

i297.photobucket.com...

I couldn't find any information if this a machine mission or people are involved in the mining?

Either way this is both fascinating and frightening.

more info here
www.newscientist.com...

A typical tonne of asteroidal rock is worth $1 million in orbit – but only $4000 on Earth," said Mark Sonter, a mining consultant in Australia and a member of DSI's board of directors. "If we can get it in space where we want it to be used, it's potentially extremely valuable material."

DSI hopes to eventually help build, fuel and operate satellites in orbit, without ever bringing the components back to Earth.

As a first step, DSI plans to launch three laptop-sized satellites called FireFlies in 2015 to observe near-Earth asteroids and identify which ones would be the best targets for mining. In 2016, it plans to launch DragonFly spacecraft to bring samples weighing between 23 and 45 kilograms back to Earth.

Then in 2020, the company hopes to start harvesting asteroids for useful goods, particularly the raw products of fuel. DSI expects its first clients to be the owners of the communications satellites that require propellant to stay in their designated orbits.

DSI is also developing a space-based 3D printer called the MicroGravity Foundry, which would grind up asteroids, separate out the useful bits and fuse them into manufactured goods. The firm also wants to build orbiting platforms that can beam high-speed internet and cheap solar energy to anywhere on Earth.

Space will drive the next industrial revolution and provide a much needed economic boost to the economy of the countries who participate.

Even the early, un-manned projects will drive a new wave of high tech jobs and a much needed boost in science, engineering and mathematics professionals. It's not outside the realm of possibility that the children around right now will one day have the option to go work in space.

Americans had better hope American companies take the lead and drive this. We're up against Nationalized efforts by countries such as China, mainly and several others who are racing to beat us there and claim everything they possibly can.

There are not many fields left on this planet able to create the industrial titans that mining, oil and finance did. The huge corporations and billionaires of science fiction will be the ones in real life who deliver robotics, oil-free energy and the colonization of space. This is your chance to invest in the ground floor of companies who will make your family wealthy just by buying and holding onto the right stocks.

One of the main reason's I clicked on this thread is the fact that it had firefly in the title. That was even mentioned in the youtube presentation. This truly brings me excitement to see the possibilities in the future. I have to admit, that is the first video presentation I watched completely that was longer than an hour.

Originally posted by Zanti Misfit
reply to post by optimus primal

 

Asteroids Will Oneday Actually Be " Spaceships" if Society Embraces Certain Technologies over the Long Term that could Possibly lead into a Perminate Presence in Space for Mankind...... but Good Luck with that Eh ? L5 Society , the Time has Come NOW Dispite the Possibility of an Alien Presence in Orbit Around Our Planet !.......... ........

So says my Friend " Conspiracy Hal and his Cat J. Edgar Hoover Jr. .

i297.photobucket.com...

edit on 23-1-2013 by Zanti Misfit because: (no reason given)

I'm not sure I understand. Are you being sarcastic towards what I said? If so, why? I made no conspiracy comments, nor comments about aliens.