• echo64@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    This is a lot of exciting words to say “instead of digging up the effectively limitless amount of rock under our feet we can go into space to do it in the least efficient and most expensive way”

    It’s very cool, but I would rather we spend our time and resources on more pressing things, given we have the rocks right here.

    • vmaziman@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      I would agree if mining the rocks on earth didn’t cause ecological collapses and kill off animals and displace indigenous and exploit underprivileged ethnic classes in post colonial hellholes

      • vmaziman@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        I’m sure mining in space will have its own problems but at least it can’t kill our biosphere

        • schmidtster@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          There’s been studies that have found metal particles in the atmosphere, so anything entering and exiting are seemingly shedding particles.

          So it’s likely to cause issues down the road unfortunately.

          • Neshura@bookwormstory.social
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            1 year ago

            I’ll take the issue down the road over the one already in my doorstep any time of the week.

            Atmospheric pollution is at least something that seems fixable with extraterrestrial resources. Ruined biospheres due to mining on earth seems less avoidable/fixable unless we go back to pre-industrial living standards.

            • schmidtster@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              How would it be fixable? The more stuff entering and exiting the atmosphere, the more particles. The particles aren’t from manufacturing on earth from what I read.

              • Neshura@bookwormstory.social
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                1 year ago

                Particles we can bind with chemical reactions (like ad-blu for diesel engines), would be expensive and we would need to be careful to select chemical reactions that actually solve the problem but fundamentally it’s a fixable problem.

                • schmidtster@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Right, so by adding more chemicals, causing more unknown issues, we can fix an unknown issue. Which we would need to strip earth for even more to get to be able to use.

                  Makes total sense!

                  • Neshura@bookwormstory.social
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                    1 year ago

                    Adding chemicals to reduce pollution is how every internal combustion engine works, especially diesel engines.

                    Sodium reacts explosively with water, Chlorine is a lethal substance to humans yet when the two chemicals react they become a necessary part for our bodies. There are ways to turn toxic/harmful materials into harmless ones by adding more chemicals. The key part is making sure the result is actually harmless, which we can.

                    Edit: also in how far would we need to strip earth further for this solution? In this scenario we’re already mining asteroids in space and there are (to my knowledge) no natural materials we can find only on earth, if anything there is stuff we can’t find on earth but do in abundance in space (like Helium).

            • AA5B@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              How. Ruined biosphere from mining affects many discrete places that can be cleaned up, in theory. Messing up the atmosphere affects all biospheres, is much more vast, and we have to breathe in the meantime

              Look at current mining - true crimes against the environment in specific places but do not directly impact most humans. Could you say that about messing up the atmosphere?

              • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                Isn’t one of the current hot topics among environmentalists carbon capture, which is “cleaning up” the atmosphere as a whole?

                • shottymcb@lemm.ee
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                  1 year ago

                  The only thing carbon capture cleans up is CO2, and it’s not remotely feasible because it would require orders of magnitude more energy than the entire planet consumes even if it were 100% efficient, which it isn’t close to being.

        • Allseer@futurology.today
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          1 year ago

          the asteroid belt is like a protective barrier. if earth’s orbit was on a flat surface the belt would be on it too. this imaginary plane is where earth is most likely to collide with extraterrestrial objects. so if it was possible to reduce the asteroid belt to half its current mass, earth would technically be more vulnerable to collisions along our orbital path. it’s not the biggest threat but i felt the need to explain that.

    • lolcatnip@reddthat.com
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      1 year ago

      Rocks ≠ ore. There are numerous materials (e.g. lithium) for the total known deposits on Earth won’t cover more than a few decades’ worth of projected demand, and even then, the mining process is an environmental disaster. Asteroid mining is a long-term project that will require huge advances in multiple fields, but it addresses a real need.

      • echo64@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        known deposits. There’s functionally endless amounts of all elements we need on earth. And there is zero need to go mine asteroids at a truely astronomical cost of efficiency.

        • A_A@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I said mostly the same thing as you in (my own words) elsewhere inside this post. Most people don’t want to see this reality.

          So, maybe this is a business opportunity : to attract investment and then face investors with hard facts. Of course we write the contract so that, after this, we just keep their stupid money.

          Edit : Oops ! I just read your other comment :

          you’ll also see (…) investment scams

          And so I realize you were thinking along these lines already. (although my statement was much more cynical)

    • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      If it’s truly the “least efficient and most expensive way” of mining then you have no reason to be the slightest bit worried, it won’t get done in that case. Obviously.

      • echo64@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        This is true, but you’ll also see a lot of investment scams by internet famous people, like funding a space company on the lies of Mars colonies

        • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          SpaceX is a private company, it’s not taking investment from internet people.

          Furthermore, its Mars goals are IMO the least revolutionary part of what the Starship program is working toward.

          • echo64@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Investment scams from internet people. And I said scam like promising Mars colonization. I did not use the term revolutionary. Scam.

    • qyron@sopuli.xyz
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      1 year ago

      I can imagine a sort of a conveyor belt made of miniature cargo vessel with one robotized mining station at one end, cutting away an asteroid piece by piece, and a cargo dock at the Earth side.

      With enough cargo vessels deployed, let’s say one would arrive at each end everyother day, the moment the conveyor belt was full, the mining operation would be swift.

      Assuming a global deal between nations could be struck to have a refinery or at least a cargo dock placed on the moon, to organize large cargos to come to Earth at programmed intervals, it could prove to be a very interesting endeavour.

      Raw matterials price could drop, given the sheer available volume.

      At least it sounds like a diferent sci-fi plot