From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]

MW: There must be-- millions (if not billions)-- of
small asterioids weighing between 1000 to 10,000
tonnes that could easily be transported by automated
Drexler Lightsails into Marsian orbit for processing.

Just out of curiosity, why are you transporting them to Mars? I think we
can safely count on Earth (or at least near-Earth space) as being a market
well before Mars is. In fact, given the numerous advantages of orbital
settlements over planetary ones which O'Neill pointed out, I doubt that Mars
will ever be a very substantial market.

Such small asteroids may have to be located by
telescopes on the surface of the moon which can track
the sky and absorb light for up to 14 nights.

A telescope in HEO could track wherever it wanted, whenever it wanted. One
disadvantage of building any telescope on the surface of a celestial body is
that 50% of the sky is unavailable for viewing. As far as shading goes, an
orbital telescope could be shaded by a aluminum shield of very flimsy
construction. Such a shade could shield the telescope not half the time,
but all the time.

But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable piece
of real estate in the solar system.

But is it right to assume that the biggest asteroid is necessarily the best?
I think you were right the first time in pointing to smaller asteroids of
1000 to 10,000 tons as being the best targets. I just don't see what
advantage large size has for us here. You mention Ceres' low gravity, but
even smaller asteroids would have even smaller gravities. As far as surface
area goes, I think we will manufacture our surface area in the form of
orbital habitats. In this scenario, even asteroids of modest tonnage, once
processed, can provide a most impressive amount of surface area.

Regards,

Mike Combs

From:
Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
MW: There must be-- millions (if not billions)-- of
small asterioids weighing between 1000 to 10,000
tonnes that could easily be transported by automated
Drexler Lightsails into Marsian orbit for processing.

Just out of curiosity, why are you transporting them to Mars? I think we can safely count on Earth (or at least near-Earth space) as being a market well before Mars is. In fact, given the numerous advantages of orbital settlements over planetary ones which O'Neill pointed out, I doubt that Mars will ever be a very substantial market.

Such small asteroids may have to be located by
telescopes on the surface of the moon which can track
the sky and absorb light for up to 14 nights.

A telescope in HEO could track wherever it wanted, whenever it wanted. One disadvantage of building any telescope on the surface of a celestial body is that 50% of the sky is unavailable for viewing. As far as shading goes, an orbital telescope could be shaded by a aluminum shield of very flimsy construction. Such a shade could shield the telescope not half the time, but all the time.
But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable piece
of real estate in the solar system.

But is it right to assume that the biggest asteroid is necessarily the best? I think you were right the first time in pointing to smaller asteroids of 1000 to 10,000 tons as being the best targets. I just don't see what advantage large size has for us here. You mention Ceres' low gravity, but even smaller asteroids would have even smaller gravities. As far as surface area goes, I think we will manufacture our surface area in the form of orbital habitats. In this scenario, even asteroids of modest tonnage, once processed, can provide a most impressive amount of surface area.

Regards,
Mike Combs

--- "Combs, Mike" wrote:
> From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
>
> MW: There must be-- millions (if not billions)-- of
> small asterioids weighing between 1000 to 10,000
> tonnes that could easily be transported by automated
> Drexler Lightsails into Marsian orbit for
> processing.
>
> Combs, Mike: Just out of curiosity, why are you
transporting them
> to Mars? I think we
> can safely count on Earth (or at least near-Earth
> space) as being a market
> well before Mars is. In fact, given the numerous
> advantages of orbital
> settlements over planetary ones which O'Neill
> pointed out, I doubt that Mars
> will ever be a very substantial market.

MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
companys to do this. What about asteroid
transportation companies based in third world
countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
look trivial.

Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
resources necessary for human survival. And a much
lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.

>
> MW: Such small asteroids may have to be located by
> telescopes on the surface of the moon which can
> track
> the sky and absorb light for up to 14 nights.
>
>Mike Combs: A telescope in HEO could track wherever
it wanted,
> whenever it wanted. One
> disadvantage of building any telescope on the
> surface of a celestial body is
> that 50% of the sky is unavailable for viewing. As
> far as shading goes, an
> orbital telescope could be shaded by a aluminum
> shield of very flimsy
> construction. Such a shade could shield the
> telescope not half the time,
> but all the time.
>
MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon. And
lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
there would be people there already. A space telescope
would be a lot more expensive to repair.

> MW: But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
> belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
> go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
> Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
> square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
> low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable
> piece
> of real estate in the solar system.
>
> Mike Combs: But is it right to assume that the
biggest asteroid
> is necessarily the best?
> I think you were right the first time in pointing to
> smaller asteroids of
> 1000 to 10,000 tons as being the best targets. I
> just don't see what
> advantage large size has for us here. You mention
> Ceres' low gravity, but
> even smaller asteroids would have even smaller
> gravities. As far as surface
> area goes, I think we will manufacture our surface
> area in the form of
> orbital habitats. In this scenario, even asteroids
> of modest tonnage, once
> processed, can provide a most impressive amount of
> surface area.
>
> Regards,
>
> Mike Combs
>
MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
since they would be to heavy to transport into a
planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
would be very high since you would have to find people
willing to work in isolation in such environments.

Ceres is a C-type of asteroid that probably has all of
the elements required for an industrial society in
abundance. And with a gravity well below that of even
the moon, it would be extremely cheap to transport
materials off its surface. And being the largest
asteroid would mean that many companys could
congregate there to exploit its resources. And that
would mean hundreds, possibly even tens of thousands,
of people working on its surface or in orbit around
the asteroid. So there would be much less of a feeling
of isolation with so many others also working there.
And Ceres would have the equivalent resources of
approximately 1 million 1 kilometer asteroids-- all in
one place. Ceres is clearly the motherload of
asteroids. And only those asteroids that you could
transport by lightsail would be cheaper to exploit,
IMO, than the largest asteroids.

Marcel F. Williams
1/4/00

From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]

MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
companys to do this. What about asteroid
transportation companies based in third world
countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
look trivial.

Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
resources necessary for human survival. And a much
lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.

I'll be the first to admit that protests from self-styled "eco-activist" who
aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to overcome. But I have a hard
time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so much as bring an
asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is the best place to build
satellites from asteroidal resources". If the market for these satellites
is an Earth market, that to me means the logical place to build them is HEO,
where your workforce is much closer to Earth.

Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids whole, perhaps we should only bring
in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of which would be too
small to do major damage even if it did strike the Earth. Alternately, one
could propose building the satellites in the Belt, and only importing the
finished product. At least this would reduce the tonnage being nudged
toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the stopover at Mars.

Personally, I would vote for transporting asteroidal resources to either L-4
or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply educating the populace
that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the moon would not pose a
significant danger to the Earth.

But if we're talking an Earth orbit market, I wouldn't expect Main Belt
resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use of NEOs, and lunar
resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids will be used, but I
think they'll be used in place, by folks living permanently in the Belt.

Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an attempt to involve Mars
out of a sense of romance, with no real consideration of the value Mars adds
to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on this maillist would be
familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main thrust of which was that
planets are not the best places for expanding industrial civilizations.
Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less to do with the
industrialization or settlement of space than what most people tend to
think.

MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.

I'm assuming use of lunar resources to build them (provided that we're
talking about really giant telescopes). In that case, the only added
expense would be the cost of lifting the resources out of the lunar gravity
well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could do this for pennies a
pound. It's also likely that manufacturing processes in HEO will be less
expensive than on the lunar surface due to the constant availability of
sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may have benefits. I don't
think the difference in price tags would be all that much, and the added
flexibility of being able to point wherever you want might be worth
something.

Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger and flimsier than what
would be possible in 1/6th G.

And
lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
there would be people there already. A space telescope
would be a lot more expensive to repair.

Why assume that there would be people available on the lunar surface, but
not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's maillist, where we were
taking it for granted that there are going to be space settlements.

If we want to talk about transportation costs to and from Earth, obviously
they are less for HEO than for the lunar surface.

MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
since they would be to heavy to transport into a
planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
would be very high since you would have to find people
willing to work in isolation in such environments.

Ceres is a C-type of asteroid that probably has all of
the elements required for an industrial society in
abundance. And with a gravity well below that of even
the moon, it would be extremely cheap to transport
materials off its surface. And being the largest
asteroid would mean that many companys could
congregate there to exploit its resources. And that
would mean hundreds, possibly even tens of thousands,
of people working on its surface or in orbit around
the asteroid. So there would be much less of a feeling
of isolation with so many others also working there.
And Ceres would have the equivalent resources of
approximately 1 million 1 kilometer asteroids-- all in
one place. Ceres is clearly the motherload of
asteroids. And only those asteroids that you could
transport by lightsail would be cheaper to exploit,
IMO, than the largest asteroids.

OK, I think I see your argument now. Yes, there might be some synergistic
advantage to clustering our facilities and settlements.

Regards,

Mike Combs

From:
Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
companys to do this. What about asteroid
transportation companies based in third world
countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
look trivial.
Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
resources necessary for human survival. And a much
lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.

I'll be the first to admit that protests from self-styled "eco-activist" who aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to overcome. But I have a hard time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so much as bring an asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is the best place to build satellites from asteroidal resources". If the market for these satellites is an Earth market, that to me means the logical place to build them is HEO, where your workforce is much closer to Earth.

Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids whole, perhaps we should only bring in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of which would be too small to do major damage even if it did strike the Earth. Alternately, one could propose building the satellites in the Belt, and only importing the finished product. At least this would reduce the tonnage being nudged toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the stopover at Mars.

Personally, I would vote for transporting asteroidal resources to either L-4 or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply educating the populace that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the moon would not pose a significant danger to the Earth.

But if we're talking an Earth orbit market, I wouldn't expect Main Belt resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use of NEOs, and lunar resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids will be used, but I think they'll be used in place, by folks living permanently in the Belt.

Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an attempt to involve Mars out of a sense of romance, with no real consideration of the value Mars adds to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on this maillist would be familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main thrust of which was that planets are not the best places for expanding industrial civilizations. Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less to do with the industrialization or settlement of space than what most people tend to think.
MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.

I'm assuming use of lunar resources to build them (provided that we're talking about really giant telescopes). In that case, the only added expense would be the cost of lifting the resources out of the lunar gravity well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could do this for pennies a pound. It's also likely that manufacturing processes in HEO will be less expensive than on the lunar surface due to the constant availability of sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may have benefits. I don't think the difference in price tags would be all that much, and the added flexibility of being able to point wherever you want might be worth something.

Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger and flimsier than what would be possible in 1/6th G.

And
lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
there would be people there already. A space telescope
would be a lot more expensive to repair.

Why assume that there would be people available on the lunar surface, but not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's maillist, where we were taking it for granted that there are going to be space settlements.

If we want to talk about transportation costs to and from Earth, obviously they are less for HEO than for the lunar surface.
MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
since they would be to heavy to transport into a
planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
would be very high since you would have to find people
willing to work in isolation in such environments.
Ceres is a C-type of asteroid that probably has all of
the elements required for an industrial society in
abundance. And with a gravity well below that of even
the moon, it would be extremely cheap to transport
materials off its surface. And being the largest
asteroid would mean that many companys could
congregate there to exploit its resources. And that
would mean hundreds, possibly even tens of thousands,
of people working on its surface or in orbit around
the asteroid. So there would be much less of a feeling
of isolation with so many others also working there.
And Ceres would have the equivalent resources of
approximately 1 million 1 kilometer asteroids-- all in
one place. Ceres is clearly the motherload of
asteroids. And only those asteroids that you could
transport by lightsail would be cheaper to exploit,
IMO, than the largest asteroids.
OK, I think I see your argument now. Yes, there might be some synergistic advantage to clustering our facilities and settlements.

Regards,
Mike Combs

--- "Combs, Mike" wrote:
> From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the
> equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit.
> But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot
> bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of
> 1970's
> look trivial.
>
> Mars, however, also has practically all of the
> natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would
> be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000
> to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated
> to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of
> asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
>
> MiKe Combs: I'll be the first to admit that protests
from
> self-styled "eco-activist" who
> aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to
> overcome. But I have a hard
> time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so
> much as bring an
> asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is
> the best place to build
> satellites from asteroidal resources". If the
> market for these satellites
> is an Earth market, that to me means the logical
> place to build them is HEO,
> where your workforce is much closer to Earth.

MW: Again, the politics of the protestors would be
minor compared to the financial cost of insurance. And
with many different companys from many different
countries, you're also going to have to deal with the
possibility of terrorism. Send a few 1000 tonne plus
asteroids with the power of thermonuclear weapons in
the direction of Israel or some other country might
kill a few million people. Would Israel trust an
Iraqi, Iranian, or Saudi Arabian asteroid minining
company? Any country, or company, that could
transport 1000 tonne plus asteroids would instantly
have the power of mass distruction. And the ability to
kill millions. As a potential hazard, it would be far
more dangerous than the nuclear power industry.
However, you can avoid all of this by only allowing
small asteroids to be transported to worlds not near
the terra-luna system such as Mars, Mercury, Venus.
>
> MiKe Combs: Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids
whole,
> perhaps we should only bring
> in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of
> which would be too
> small to do major damage even if it did strike the
> Earth.

MW: Yes. And that could be done most efficiently on
the largest asteroids. However, if you attempted to do
this with smaller asteroids, you would probably have
to send people along with machines which would be far
more expensive than sending robotically controlled
lightsails to capture small asteroids.

Alternately, one
> could propose building the satellites in the Belt,
> and only importing the
> finished product. At least this would reduce the
> tonnage being nudged
> toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the
> stopover at Mars.
>
> MiKe Combs: Personally, I would vote for
transporting asteroidal
> resources to either L-4
> or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
> educating the populace
> that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the
> moon would not pose a
> significant danger to the Earth.
>
MW: That worked wonderfully for the nuclear power
industry in America which has put that industry almost
out of business in the states.

>MiKe Combs: But if we're talking an Earth orbit
market, I
> wouldn't expect Main Belt
> resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use
> of NEOs, and lunar
> resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids
> will be used, but I
> think they'll be used in place, by folks living
> permanently in the Belt.

>
> Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an
> attempt to involve Mars
> out of a sense of romance, with no real
> consideration of the value Mars adds
> to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on
> this maillist would be
> familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main
> thrust of which was that
> planets are not the best places for expanding
> industrial civilizations.
> Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less
> to do with the
> industrialization or settlement of space than what
> most people tend to
> think.
>
MW: I agree that in the long run, O'Neill type space
islands-- which I call cosmodromes-- are the best
places for expanding industrial civilization. But the
construction of such habitats will ony become
affordable after the industrialization of the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids. And space islands will not
have a-- significant-- impact on human civilization,
IMO, until the 22nd century.

There is no doubt in my mind that the manufacturing
and launching of satellites from the surface of the
moon will ignite space industrialization. But the moon
lacks affordable access to elements like hydrogen,
carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, that are essential in the
manufacturing process. Mars has all of these and and
also a significantly lower gravity well than the
earth and could transport these elements into orbit
and then by light sail to lunar orbit far more cheaply
than transporting them from the surface of the earth.
The industrialization of the Moon will not be
sucessful unless we also industrialize Mars, IMO. And
the cheapest place to transport and process small
asteroids would be in Mars orbit because the surface
of Mars which is as large as all the land area on
Earth could support easily support millions of people
who could operate remote controled orbital asteroid
processing stations from the marsian surface. And I
think Mars will dominate asteroid processing in the
solar system until cosmodromes finally come to
dominate this industry in the 22nd century.

> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.
>
> MiKe Combs: I'm assuming use of lunar resources to
build them
> (provided that we're
> talking about really giant telescopes). In that
> case, the only added
> expense would be the cost of lifting the resources
> out of the lunar gravity
> well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could
> do this for pennies a
> pound. It's also likely that manufacturing
> processes in HEO will be less
> expensive than on the lunar surface due to the
> constant availability of
> sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may
> have benefits. I don't
> think the difference in price tags would be all that
> much, and the added
> flexibility of being able to point wherever you want
> might be worth
> something.
>
> Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger
> and flimsier than what
> would be possible in 1/6th G.
>
MW: In the long run, it would be even cheaper just to
build the telescopes out of asteroid material. But
again, machines do have problems on occassion and it
would be much cheaper to walk or ride down to a nearby
telescope on the moon near your lunar base than to
take a rocket into orbit.

> MW: And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space
> telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
>
> MiKe Combs: Why assume that there would be people
available on
> the lunar surface, but
> not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's
> maillist, where we were
> taking it for granted that there are going to be
> space settlements.

MW: There will never be any large O'Neill type space
settlements until you first industrialize the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids, IMO. And once you begin to
manufacture them, its going to take at least a century
before such artificial worlds have a significant
impact on the humanity to significantly reduce human
populations on Earth. But without industrializing the
moon, Mars, and the asteroids, it is unlikely that
such space islands will ever come true, IMO.

Marcel F. Williams
1/4/00

Right problem; wrong solution - choosing resonant Earthgrazers & automated
systems (with human operators optional) does away with the bulk of the
transport problems & sending your processed material via the Moon - assuming
that's actually intended for Earth use; which may not be the case - does
away with OOPS problem. Putting masses in Mars orbit also runs foul of the
great push for Mars exploration on the basis that it may contain life -
trust me: the heat generated by dropping large lumps on the Red Planet will
be every bit as investment breaking as a similar proposal in Earth orbit.
Blame Zubrin, McKay & Goldin if you like; but the damage has already been
done.
*
In the mid size range, sure. You can hollow out asteroids; add free flying
concentrating lens & or reflectors; & turn them into truly humungous
instruments that makes ESA's mighty Zeus look like a minor deity; but this
is further down the track.
*
See my other comments: many of these objects are already in orbits resonant
on Earth, meaning that regular delivery runs to & from the objects
comparatively easy. You don't put people - if you use people at all - on the
surface of such bodies; you dig them under the surface to take advantage of
artiificial garvity caused by the asteroid's rotation... only automated
units to process the regolith (as solar panels; for eg) should appear on the
surface.

All the best,
Robert Clements

> Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2001 12:25:53 -0800 (PST)
> From: Marcel Williams
> Subject: Re: Asteroid use
>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
> look trivial.
>
> Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
*
> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon. And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
*

--- "Clements, Robert"
> Right problem; wrong solution - choosing resonant
> Earthgrazers & automated
> systems (with human operators optional) does away
> with the bulk of the
> transport problems & sending your processed material
> via the Moon - assuming
> that's actually intended for Earth use; which may
> not be the case - does
> away with OOPS problem. Putting masses in Mars orbit
> also runs foul of the
> great push for Mars exploration on the basis that it
> may contain life -
> trust me: the heat generated by dropping large lumps
> on the Red Planet will
> be every bit as investment breaking as a similar
> proposal in Earth orbit.
> Blame Zubrin, McKay & Goldin if you like; but the
> damage has already been
> done.

MW: I'm against spending any tax payer money to send
humans to Mars just to look for life. Mars has the
chemicals that the Moon needs for satellite
manufacturing and launching. And once we have a
permanent industrial presence on the Moon and Mars
then the asteroids will be easy pickin's and the human
economy will grow from a multi-trillion dollar one to
a multi-quadrillion dollar economy. And a
multi-quadrillion dollar economy will easily be able
to afford to build islands in space.

Marcel F. Williams
1/4/01

The mischiefmaker in me suggests that there are plenty of technologies which
will stuff up the NMD... Rob Zubrin pointed out - albeit in a different
context - how small solar sails will do the job without invoking 1000MT
asteroids....

If you read what i write, you'll see that i'm not talking about moving
asteroids around willy nilly (indeed: if the primary resource being sold is
power [very likely in the earliest days of spacemining], you don't have to
move the asteroid around at all)... in situ processing on Earthgrazing
asteroids in Earth resonant orbits does away with the bulk of mass movement;
& allows cost effective asteroid stripping.

In re: Mars as a factory site: very ordinary; except for in situ
consumption... the gravity well may be smaller than the Earth's; but that
doesn't mean it's actually small. Luna is a better choice; but if real space
settlement is the goal; you need to kick the planetary chauvinism & look to
the interiors of rocky asteroids for unlimited living space.

All the best,
Robert Clements

> MW: I'm against spending any tax payer money to send
> humans to Mars just to look for life. Mars has the
> chemicals that the Moon needs for satellite
> manufacturing and launching. And once we have a
> permanent industrial presence on the Moon and Mars
> then the asteroids will be easy pickin's and the human
> economy will grow from a multi-trillion dollar one to
> a multi-quadrillion dollar economy. And a
> multi-quadrillion dollar economy will easily be able
> to afford to build islands in space.
>
&

Mike, and interested readers,

>From my study of nuclear power, I can assure you that earthlings can be hyper-emotional when it comes to safety and that imagined fears can be more important than real ones.

A carbonaceous asteroid or comet in orbit around Earth would make an ideal refueling stop, but I am confident that Mars or Venus will be used to "practice" on many times before Earth will permit technology to place a massive object in orbit around Earth, even if said object is scheduled to hit the earth in the distant future.

Mars is a likely target for initial testing due to it's proximity to the asteroid belt and because if a comet crashes, then there would be no loss of life and the added volatiles may benefit Mars terraforming engineers.

Your idea of transporting either the finished goods or smaller cargos makes sense for initial phases.

It may be wise not to shut-out any colonization effort (i.e. planet vs. colony vs star) since the economics and political will in the future will make the final decision. You see, Mike, we could send a mission to Mars with current technology and around 50 billion dollars. We could do marvelous things on Mars for only 10% of the defense budget, but what could we do in space colonization for the same amount? Two major technological breakthroughs are needed IMO:
1) Much lower launch costs, and
2) Advanced telerobotics to mine, manufacture and assemble fabrications in space remotely from a space station or from a planet such as Earth or Mars. Mars, with it's closer proximity to the asteroid belt, may be better suited part of time when Earth is on the far side of the sun from the asteroid in question. Naturally, if you can transport the asteroid to orbit around Earth, then this would only leave the issue of huge rockets to transport the asteroid.

So, you see, we are technologically ready for Mars, and to colonize Mars, but we lack technology for a massive space colony.

Cheers,

Tom
From: Combs, Mike
To: 'spacesettlers@egroups.com'
Sent: Thursday, January 04, 2001 1:12 PM
Subject: RE: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use

From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]

MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
companys to do this. What about asteroid
transportation companies based in third world
countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
look trivial.

Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
resources necessary for human survival. And a much
lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
I'll be the first to admit that protests from self-styled "eco-activist" who aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to overcome. But I have a hard time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so much as bring an asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is the best place to build satellites from asteroidal resources". If the market for these satellites is an Earth market, that to me means the logical place to build them is HEO, where your workforce is much closer to Earth.

Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids whole, perhaps we should only bring in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of which would be too small to do major damage even if it did strike the Earth. Alternately, one could propose building the satellites in the Belt, and only importing the finished product. At least this would reduce the tonnage being nudged toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the stopover at Mars.

Personally, I would vote for transporting asteroidal resources to either L-4 or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply educating the populace that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the moon would not pose a significant danger to the Earth.

But if we're talking an Earth orbit market, I wouldn't expect Main Belt resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use of NEOs, and lunar resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids will be used, but I think they'll be used in place, by folks living permanently in the Belt.

Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an attempt to involve Mars out of a sense of romance, with no real consideration of the value Mars adds to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on this maillist would be familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main thrust of which was that planets are not the best places for expanding industrial civilizations. Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less to do with the industrialization or settlement of space than what most people tend to think.
MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.
I'm assuming use of lunar resources to build them (provided that we're talking about really giant telescopes). In that case, the only added expense would be the cost of lifting the resources out of the lunar gravity well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could do this for pennies a pound. It's also likely that manufacturing processes in HEO will be less expensive than on the lunar surface due to the constant availability of sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may have benefits. I don't think the difference in price tags would be all that much, and the added flexibility of being able to point wherever you want might be worth something.

Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger and flimsier than what would be possible in 1/6th G.
And
lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
there would be people there already. A space telescope
would be a lot more expensive to repair.
Why assume that there would be people available on the lunar surface, but not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's maillist, where we were taking it for granted that there are going to be space settlements.

If we want to talk about transportation costs to and from Earth, obviously they are less for HEO than for the lunar surface.
MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
since they would be to heavy to transport into a
planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
would be very high since you would have to find people
willing to work in isolation in such environments.

Ceres is a C-type of asteroid that probably has all of
the elements required for an industrial society in
abundance. And with a gravity well below that of even
the moon, it would be extremely cheap to transport
materials off its surface. And being the largest
asteroid would mean that many companys could
congregate there to exploit its resources. And that
would mean hundreds, possibly even tens of thousands,
of people working on its surface or in orbit around
the asteroid. So there would be much less of a feeling
of isolation with so many others also working there.
And Ceres would have the equivalent resources of
approximately 1 million 1 kilometer asteroids-- all in
one place. Ceres is clearly the motherload of
asteroids. And only those asteroids that you could
transport by lightsail would be cheaper to exploit,
IMO, than the largest asteroids.
OK, I think I see your argument now. Yes, there might be some synergistic advantage to clustering our facilities and settlements.

Regards,

Mike Combs

From my study of nuclear power, I can assure you that earthlings can be hyper-emotional when it comes to safety and that imagined fears can be more important than real ones.

A carbonaceous asteroid or comet in orbit around Earth would make an ideal refueling stop, but I am confident that Mars or Venus will be used to "practice" on many times before Earth will permit technology to place a massive object in orbit around Earth, even if said object is scheduled to hit the earth in the distant future.

Mars is a likely target for initial testing due to it's proximity to the asteroid belt and because if a comet crashes, then there would be no loss of life and the added volatiles may benefit Mars terraforming engineers.

Your idea of transporting either the finished goods or smaller cargos makes sense for initial phases.

It may be wise not to shut-out any colonization effort (i.e. planet vs. colony vs star) since the economics and political will in the future will make the final decision. You see, Mike, we could send a mission to Mars with current technology and around 50 billion dollars. We could do marvelous things on Mars for only 10% of the defense budget, but what could we do in space colonization for the same amount? Two major technological breakthroughs are needed IMO:
1) Much lower launch costs, and
2) Advanced telerobotics to mine, manufacture and assemble fabrications in space remotely from a space station or from a planet such as Earth or Mars. Mars, with it's closer proximity to the asteroid belt, may be better suited part of time when Earth is on the far side of the sun from the asteroid in question. Naturally, if you can transport the asteroid to orbit around Earth, then this would only leave the issue of huge rockets to transport the asteroid.

So, you see, we are technologically ready for Mars, and to colonize Mars, but we lack technology for a massive space colony.

Cheers,

Tom
From:
Combs, Mike
To:
'spacesettlers@egroups.com'
Sent:
Thursday, January 04, 2001 1:12 PM
Subject:
RE: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use
From:
Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
companys to do this. What about asteroid
transportation companies based in third world
countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
look trivial.
Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
resources necessary for human survival. And a much
lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.

I'll be the first to admit that protests from self-styled "eco-activist" who aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to overcome. But I have a hard time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so much as bring an asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is the best place to build satellites from asteroidal resources". If the market for these satellites is an Earth market, that to me means the logical place to build them is HEO, where your workforce is much closer to Earth.

Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids whole, perhaps we should only bring in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of which would be too small to do major damage even if it did strike the Earth. Alternately, one could propose building the satellites in the Belt, and only importing the finished product. At least this would reduce the tonnage being nudged toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the stopover at Mars.

Personally, I would vote for transporting asteroidal resources to either L-4 or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply educating the populace that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the moon would not pose a significant danger to the Earth.

But if we're talking an Earth orbit market, I wouldn't expect Main Belt resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use of NEOs, and lunar resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids will be used, but I think they'll be used in place, by folks living permanently in the Belt.

Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an attempt to involve Mars out of a sense of romance, with no real consideration of the value Mars adds to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on this maillist would be familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main thrust of which was that planets are not the best places for expanding industrial civilizations. Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less to do with the industrialization or settlement of space than what most people tend to think.
MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.

I'm assuming use of lunar resources to build them (provided that we're talking about really giant telescopes). In that case, the only added expense would be the cost of lifting the resources out of the lunar gravity well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could do this for pennies a pound. It's also likely that manufacturing processes in HEO will be less expensive than on the lunar surface due to the constant availability of sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may have benefits. I don't think the difference in price tags would be all that much, and the added flexibility of being able to point wherever you want might be worth something.

Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger and flimsier than what would be possible in 1/6th G.

And
lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
there would be people there already. A space telescope
would be a lot more expensive to repair.

Why assume that there would be people available on the lunar surface, but not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's maillist, where we were taking it for granted that there are going to be space settlements.

If we want to talk about transportation costs to and from Earth, obviously they are less for HEO than for the lunar surface.
MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
since they would be to heavy to transport into a
planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
would be very high since you would have to find people
willing to work in isolation in such environments.
Ceres is a C-type of asteroid that probably has all of
the elements required for an industrial society in
abundance. And with a gravity well below that of even
the moon, it would be extremely cheap to transport
materials off its surface. And being the largest
asteroid would mean that many companys could
congregate there to exploit its resources. And that
would mean hundreds, possibly even tens of thousands,
of people working on its surface or in orbit around
the asteroid. So there would be much less of a feeling
of isolation with so many others also working there.
And Ceres would have the equivalent resources of
approximately 1 million 1 kilometer asteroids-- all in
one place. Ceres is clearly the motherload of
asteroids. And only those asteroids that you could
transport by lightsail would be cheaper to exploit,
IMO, than the largest asteroids.
OK, I think I see your argument now. Yes, there might be some synergistic advantage to clustering our facilities and settlements.

Regards,
Mike Combs

>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
> look trivial.
>

a 1000 tonnes of steel is equal to a cube 5m on a side. A meteor
that big will produce a crater maybe 50 m in diameter. Its not equal
to a 2.5 megaton nuclear bomb. If you thin it is, I would like to see
the numbers to back it up.

> Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
>

Mars has none of the infrastructure ready, has no people for a market.
The moon would be a cheaper course than mars.

The $20 trillion satellite market everyone is talking about the total
value, not the value of the satellites. It includes the comminucation
value, the weather predicting value, and perhaps even power. It isn't
'the earth's population is going to spend 20 trillion on satellite
manufacturing'.

> >
> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon. And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
>

There are big assumptions being made here. How many people live on the
moon today? My belief is that where ever humans settle, that is where
the telescopes will be built.

> > MW: But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
> > belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
> > go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
> > Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
> > square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
> > low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable

The most obvious place to go is an asteroid that is deliberately
captured into earths orbit. in 1997 a asteriod was found that had
passed between earth and the moon about a month earlier. Had this
asteroid been found a month before its closest approach a project to
help the earth capture it was possible, and we had instant access to
space material a mere 50 000 km away.

Does nasa have such a plan on the books?

> >
> MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
> diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
> since they would be to heavy to transport into a
> planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
> to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
> if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
> would be very high since you would have to find people
> willing to work in isolation in such environments.
>
Again this depends on its location. Ceres is further than mars. If
your going to hit ceres, why not phoebus and demos instead?

The rotation of an asteroid doesn't matter much. You find the line
through which it is rotating, and start mining along that line. Once
you have a deep hole along the axis, you start mining further from the
axis from the inside of your hole.

Bill

People,

Interesting, I was talking to Lucio about this sometime ago. I often
considered the problem of somebody dropping large rocks on my head as
one of the main difficulties with using space resources in Earth
orbit. It wouldn't take much to have a load swing off course and
turn a city into a memory and a reason to start a war. Of course I
was looking at material that was already in orbit and was heading to
Earth surface after being worked on. The same does not apply to
moving a rock from what ever orbit it is currently in, to one in the
Earth Moon system. Unless you have some kind of exotic propulsion
system then getting a large mass of rock and metal moving is not a
quick affair, giving anybody (the orbital equivalent of air traffic
control?) plenty of time to watch what you are doing and then watch
the new orbit of the rock. This means that the in order to use it to
wipe out a city of some unfriendly you would need it to be on an
innocent orbit for just about all of the trip and then at the last
second (which would in fact be a number of days) have it change
course and fall on your victim. The problem with this is it gives
them a lot fair amount of time to respond, they couldn't stop it mind
you, just hit back before it falls. Now if you have the technology
to do all of this then you also have the technology to build large
missiles and probably the warheads as well. Much faster. Anybody
who starts a rock moving towards you is giving you months if not
years of lead time to stop it or shoot back. Anything that comes in
fast is already suspect and will be reason to act and even moving
fast still means months. Moving it at the last moment is a non-
trivial exercise, just work out for yourself how hard it would be for
you to change a large mass (say a rock with 5% iron content 1000m in
diameter) from L4 orbit to Earth impact orbit, just before it enters
L4 orbit and how long it will take to make the trip.

No, dropping big rocks on the heads our people you don't like is most
likely going to happen when you move something people are expecting
to fall down from where is was going to happen to where you want it
to happen. You could do this with just hours or minutes warning and
it would work best with lots of middle sized objects rather than one
big one. Mind you all of this is predicated on there being more than
one group with the ability to work in orbit. If you have just one
nation or group able to work in space then the dropping large rocks
idea takes on a whole different face.

Darren

> The mischiefmaker in me suggests that there are plenty of
technologies which
> will stuff up the NMD... Rob Zubrin pointed out - albeit in a
different
> context - how small solar sails will do the job without invoking
1000MT
> asteroids....
>
> If you read what i write, you'll see that i'm not talking about
moving
> asteroids around willy nilly (indeed: if the primary resource being
sold is
> power [very likely in the earliest days of spacemining], you don't
have to
> move the asteroid around at all)... in situ processing on
Earthgrazing
> asteroids in Earth resonant orbits does away with the bulk of mass
movement;
> & allows cost effective asteroid stripping.
>
> In re: Mars as a factory site: very ordinary; except for in situ
> consumption... the gravity well may be smaller than the Earth's;
but that
> doesn't mean it's actually small. Luna is a better choice; but if
real space
> settlement is the goal; you need to kick the planetary chauvinism &
look to

Marcel,

Perhaps when we start doing things that affect the entire world, then we should start thinking about a world government?

It may be that in order for us to successfully colonize the solar system, we must first successfully colonize Earth to the extent that we can go to space as earthlings rather than as a national?

Cheers,

Tom
From: Marcel Williams
To: spacesettlers@egroups.com
Sent: Thursday, January 04, 2001 4:21 PM
Subject: RE: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use

--- "Combs, Mike" wrote:
> From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the
> equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit.
> But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot
> bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of
> 1970's
> look trivial.
>
> Mars, however, also has practically all of the
> natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would
> be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000
> to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated
> to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of
> asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
>
> MiKe Combs: I'll be the first to admit that protests
from
> self-styled "eco-activist" who
> aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to
> overcome. But I have a hard
> time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so
> much as bring an
> asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is
> the best place to build
> satellites from asteroidal resources". If the
> market for these satellites
> is an Earth market, that to me means the logical
> place to build them is HEO,
> where your workforce is much closer to Earth.

MW: Again, the politics of the protestors would be
minor compared to the financial cost of insurance. And
with many different companys from many different
countries, you're also going to have to deal with the
possibility of terrorism. Send a few 1000 tonne plus
asteroids with the power of thermonuclear weapons in
the direction of Israel or some other country might
kill a few million people. Would Israel trust an
Iraqi, Iranian, or Saudi Arabian asteroid minining
company? Any country, or company, that could
transport 1000 tonne plus asteroids would instantly
have the power of mass distruction. And the ability to
kill millions. As a potential hazard, it would be far
more dangerous than the nuclear power industry.
However, you can avoid all of this by only allowing
small asteroids to be transported to worlds not near
the terra-luna system such as Mars, Mercury, Venus.
>
> MiKe Combs: Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids
whole,
> perhaps we should only bring
> in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of
> which would be too
> small to do major damage even if it did strike the
> Earth.

MW: Yes. And that could be done most efficiently on
the largest asteroids. However, if you attempted to do
this with smaller asteroids, you would probably have
to send people along with machines which would be far
more expensive than sending robotically controlled
lightsails to capture small asteroids.

Alternately, one
> could propose building the satellites in the Belt,
> and only importing the
> finished product. At least this would reduce the
> tonnage being nudged
> toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the
> stopover at Mars.
>
> MiKe Combs: Personally, I would vote for
transporting asteroidal
> resources to either L-4
> or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
> educating the populace
> that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the
> moon would not pose a
> significant danger to the Earth.
>
MW: That worked wonderfully for the nuclear power
industry in America which has put that industry almost
out of business in the states.

>MiKe Combs: But if we're talking an Earth orbit
market, I
> wouldn't expect Main Belt
> resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use
> of NEOs, and lunar
> resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids
> will be used, but I
> think they'll be used in place, by folks living
> permanently in the Belt.

>
> Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an
> attempt to involve Mars
> out of a sense of romance, with no real
> consideration of the value Mars adds
> to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on
> this maillist would be
> familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main
> thrust of which was that
> planets are not the best places for expanding
> industrial civilizations.
> Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less
> to do with the
> industrialization or settlement of space than what
> most people tend to
> think.
>
MW: I agree that in the long run, O'Neill type space
islands-- which I call cosmodromes-- are the best
places for expanding industrial civilization. But the
construction of such habitats will ony become
affordable after the industrialization of the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids. And space islands will not
have a-- significant-- impact on human civilization,
IMO, until the 22nd century.

There is no doubt in my mind that the manufacturing
and launching of satellites from the surface of the
moon will ignite space industrialization. But the moon
lacks affordable access to elements like hydrogen,
carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, that are essential in the
manufacturing process. Mars has all of these and and
also a significantly lower gravity well than the
earth and could transport these elements into orbit
and then by light sail to lunar orbit far more cheaply
than transporting them from the surface of the earth.
The industrialization of the Moon will not be
sucessful unless we also industrialize Mars, IMO. And
the cheapest place to transport and process small
asteroids would be in Mars orbit because the surface
of Mars which is as large as all the land area on
Earth could support easily support millions of people
who could operate remote controled orbital asteroid
processing stations from the marsian surface. And I
think Mars will dominate asteroid processing in the
solar system until cosmodromes finally come to
dominate this industry in the 22nd century.

> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.
>
> MiKe Combs: I'm assuming use of lunar resources to
build them
> (provided that we're
> talking about really giant telescopes). In that
> case, the only added
> expense would be the cost of lifting the resources
> out of the lunar gravity
> well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could
> do this for pennies a
> pound. It's also likely that manufacturing
> processes in HEO will be less
> expensive than on the lunar surface due to the
> constant availability of
> sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may
> have benefits. I don't
> think the difference in price tags would be all that
> much, and the added
> flexibility of being able to point wherever you want
> might be worth
> something.
>
> Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger
> and flimsier than what
> would be possible in 1/6th G.
>
MW: In the long run, it would be even cheaper just to
build the telescopes out of asteroid material. But
again, machines do have problems on occassion and it
would be much cheaper to walk or ride down to a nearby
telescope on the moon near your lunar base than to
take a rocket into orbit.

> MW: And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space
> telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
>
> MiKe Combs: Why assume that there would be people
available on
> the lunar surface, but
> not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's
> maillist, where we were
> taking it for granted that there are going to be
> space settlements.

MW: There will never be any large O'Neill type space
settlements until you first industrialize the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids, IMO. And once you begin to
manufacture them, its going to take at least a century
before such artificial worlds have a significant
impact on the humanity to significantly reduce human
populations on Earth. But without industrializing the
moon, Mars, and the asteroids, it is unlikely that
such space islands will ever come true, IMO.

Marcel F. Williams
1/4/00

Perhaps when we start doing things that affect the entire world, then we should start thinking about a world government?

It may be that in order for us to successfully colonize the solar system, we must first successfully colonize Earth to the extent that we can go to space as earthlings rather than as a national?

Cheers,

Tom
From:
Marcel Williams
To:
spacesettlers@egroups.com
Sent:
Thursday, January 04, 2001 4:21 PM
Subject:
RE: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use
--- "Combs, Mike" <
mikecombs@...
> wrote:
> From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
>

> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the
> equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit.
> But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot
> bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of
> 1970's
> look trivial.
>
> Mars, however, also has practically all of the
> natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would
> be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000
> to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated
> to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of
> asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
>
> MiKe Combs: I'll be the first to admit that protests
from
> self-styled "eco-activist" who
> aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to
> overcome. But I have a hard
> time getting from "Protesters will scream if you so
> much as bring an
> asteroid into cislunar space" to "Logically, Mars is
> the best place to build
> satellites from asteroidal resources". If the
> market for these satellites
> is an Earth market, that to me means the logical
> place to build them is HEO,
> where your workforce is much closer to Earth.
MW: Again, the politics of the protestors would be
minor compared to the financial cost of insurance. And
with many different companys from many different
countries, you're also going to have to deal with the
possibility of terrorism. Send a few 1000 tonne plus
asteroids with the power of thermonuclear weapons in
the direction of Israel or some other country might
kill a few million people. Would Israel trust an
Iraqi, Iranian, or Saudi Arabian asteroid minining
company? Any country, or company, that could
transport 1000 tonne plus asteroids would instantly
have the power of mass distruction. And the ability to
kill millions. As a potential hazard, it would be far
more dangerous than the nuclear power industry.
However, you can avoid all of this by only allowing
small asteroids to be transported to worlds not near
the terra-luna system such as Mars, Mercury, Venus.
>
MiKe Combs: Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids
whole,
> perhaps we should only bring
> in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of
> which would be too
> small to do major damage even if it did strike the
> Earth.
MW: Yes. And that could be done most efficiently on
the largest asteroids. However, if you attempted to do
this with smaller asteroids, you would probably have
to send people along with machines which would be far
more expensive than sending robotically controlled
lightsails to capture small asteroids.
Alternately, one
> could propose building the satellites in the Belt,
> and only importing the
> finished product. At least this would reduce the
> tonnage being nudged
> toward Earth, but one could skip the step of the
> stopover at Mars.
>
> MiKe Combs: Personally, I would vote for
transporting asteroidal
> resources to either L-4
> or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
> educating the populace
> that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the
> moon would not pose a
> significant danger to the Earth.
>
MW: That worked wonderfully for the nuclear power
industry in America which has put that industry almost
out of business in the states.
>MiKe Combs: But if we're talking an Earth orbit
market, I
> wouldn't expect Main Belt
> resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use
> of NEOs, and lunar
> resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids
> will be used, but I
> think they'll be used in place, by folks living
> permanently in the Belt.
>
> Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an
> attempt to involve Mars
> out of a sense of romance, with no real
> consideration of the value Mars adds
> to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on
> this maillist would be
> familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the main
> thrust of which was that
> planets are not the best places for expanding
> industrial civilizations.
> Personally, I think Mars is going to have much less
> to do with the
> industrialization or settlement of space than what
> most people tend to
> think.
>
MW: I agree that in the long run, O'Neill type space
islands-- which I call cosmodromes-- are the best
places for expanding industrial civilization. But the
construction of such habitats will ony become
affordable after the industrialization of the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids. And space islands will not
have a-- significant-- impact on human civilization,
IMO, until the 22nd century.
There is no doubt in my mind that the manufacturing
and launching of satellites from the surface of the
moon will ignite space industrialization. But the moon
lacks affordable access to elements like hydrogen,
carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, that are essential in the
manufacturing process. Mars has all of these and and
also a significantly lower gravity well than the
earth and could transport these elements into orbit
and then by light sail to lunar orbit far more cheaply
than transporting them from the surface of the earth.
The industrialization of the Moon will not be
sucessful unless we also industrialize Mars, IMO. And
the cheapest place to transport and process small
asteroids would be in Mars orbit because the surface
of Mars which is as large as all the land area on
Earth could support easily support millions of people
who could operate remote controled orbital asteroid
processing stations from the marsian surface. And I
think Mars will dominate asteroid processing in the
solar system until cosmodromes finally come to
dominate this industry in the 22nd century.

> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.
>
> MiKe Combs: I'm assuming use of lunar resources to
build them
(provided that we're
> talking about really giant telescopes). In that
> case, the only added
> expense would be the cost of lifting the resources
> out of the lunar gravity
> well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could
> do this for pennies a
> pound. It's also likely that manufacturing
processes in HEO will be less
> expensive than on the lunar surface due to the
> constant availability of
> sunlight. It's even possible that access to 0 G may
> have benefits. I don't
> think the difference in price tags would be all that
> much, and the added
> flexibility of being able to point wherever you want
> might be worth
> something.
>
> Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger
> and flimsier than what
> would be possible in 1/6th G.
>
MW: In the long run, it would be even cheaper just to
build the telescopes out of asteroid material. But
again, machines do have problems on occassion and it
would be much cheaper to walk or ride down to a nearby
telescope on the moon near your lunar base than to
take a rocket into orbit.
> MW: And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space
> telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
>
> MiKe Combs: Why assume that there would be people
available on
> the lunar surface, but
> not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's
> maillist, where we were
> taking it for granted that there are going to be
> space settlements.
MW: There will never be any large O'Neill type space
settlements until you first industrialize the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids, IMO. And once you begin to
manufacture them, its going to take at least a century
before such artificial worlds have a significant
impact on the humanity to significantly reduce human
populations on Earth. But without industrializing the
moon, Mars, and the asteroids, it is unlikely that
such space islands will ever come true, IMO.
Marcel F. Williams
1/4/00

From: bill t
To: spacesettlers@egroups.com
Sent: Thursday, January 04, 2001 8:34 PM
Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Asteroid use

>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
> look trivial.
>

a 1000 tonnes of steel is equal to a cube 5m on a side. A meteor
that big will produce a crater maybe 50 m in diameter. Its not equal
to a 2.5 megaton nuclear bomb. If you thin it is, I would like to see
the numbers to back it up.

Bill,
I think we are getting in over our heads if we continue to speculate without using hard numbers for grounding.
A thousand tons of steel traveling at 20KM/s will certainly create a crater larger than 50 meters! You must specify your assumed velocity in order to be credible. An asteroid may enter Earth's atmosphere anywhere from 1KM/s to over 40 KM/s if retrograde. You must calculate the kenetic energy at 1/2MV2 and then convert to the equivalent tons of dynamite to get an idea of the damage that would be done.

Cheers,
Tom

> Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
>

Mars has none of the infrastructure ready, has no people for a market.
The moon would be a cheaper course than mars.

The $20 trillion satellite market everyone is talking about the total
value, not the value of the satellites. It includes the comminucation
value, the weather predicting value, and perhaps even power. It isn't
'the earth's population is going to spend 20 trillion on satellite
manufacturing'.

> >
> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon. And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
>

There are big assumptions being made here. How many people live on the
moon today? My belief is that where ever humans settle, that is where
the telescopes will be built.

> > MW: But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
> > belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
> > go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
> > Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
> > square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
> > low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable

The most obvious place to go is an asteroid that is deliberately
captured into earths orbit. in 1997 a asteriod was found that had
passed between earth and the moon about a month earlier. Had this
asteroid been found a month before its closest approach a project to
help the earth capture it was possible, and we had instant access to
space material a mere 50 000 km away.

Does nasa have such a plan on the books?

> >
> MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
> diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
> since they would be to heavy to transport into a
> planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
> to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
> if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
> would be very high since you would have to find people
> willing to work in isolation in such environments.
>
Again this depends on its location. Ceres is further than mars. If
your going to hit ceres, why not phoebus and demos instead?

The rotation of an asteroid doesn't matter much. You find the line
through which it is rotating, and start mining along that line. Once
you have a deep hole along the axis, you start mining further from the
axis from the inside of your hole.

Bill

From:
bill t
To:
spacesettlers@egroups.com
Sent:
Thursday, January 04, 2001 8:34 PM
Subject:
[spacesettlers] Re: Asteroid use
>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
> look trivial.
>
a 1000 tonnes of steel is equal to a cube 5m on a side. A meteor
that big will produce a crater maybe 50 m in diameter. Its not equal
to a 2.5 megaton nuclear bomb. If you thin it is, I would like to see
the numbers to back it up.
Bill,
I think we are getting in over our heads if we continue to speculate without using hard numbers for grounding.
A thousand tons of steel traveling at 20KM/s will certainly create a crater larger than 50 meters! You must specify your assumed velocity in order to be credible. An asteroid may enter Earth's atmosphere anywhere from 1KM/s to over 40 KM/s if retrograde. You must calculate the kenetic energy at 1/2MV2 and then convert to the equivalent tons of dynamite to get an idea of the damage that would be done.

Cheers,
Tom
> Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
>
Mars has none of the infrastructure ready, has no people for a market.
The moon would be a cheaper course than mars.
The $20 trillion satellite market everyone is talking about the total
value, not the value of the satellites. It includes the comminucation
value, the weather predicting value, and perhaps even power. It isn't
'the earth's population is going to spend 20 trillion on satellite
manufacturing'.
> >
> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon. And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
>
There are big assumptions being made here. How many people live on the
moon today? My belief is that where ever humans settle, that is where
the telescopes will be built.
> > MW: But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
> > belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
> > go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
> Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
> > square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
> > low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable
The most obvious place to go is an asteroid that is deliberately
captured into earths orbit. in 1997 a asteriod was found that had
passed between earth and the moon about a month earlier. Had this
asteroid been found a month before its closest approach a project to
help the earth capture it was possible, and we had instant access to
space material a mere 50 000 km away.
Does nasa have such a plan on the books?
> >
> MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
> diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
> since they would be to heavy to transport into a
> planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
> to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
> if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
> would be very high since you would have to find people
> willing to work in isolation in such environments.
>
Again this depends on its location. Ceres is further than mars. If
your going to hit ceres, why not phoebus and demos instead?
The rotation of an asteroid doesn't matter much. You find the line
through which it is rotating, and start mining along that line. Once
you have a deep hole along the axis, you start mining further from the
axis from the inside of your hole.
Bill

MW: Hollowing out asteroids would be a waste or
resources. You could probably build dozens of space
islands with with the materials you hollowed out from
the asteroid in the first place. And industrializing
the surfaces of the Moon and Mars make far more
economic sense than trying to build large space
islands at this time. Their time will come. But their
time is definitely not in the next 20 or 30 years,
IMO.

Marcel F. Williams
1/4/01

--- "Clements, Robert"

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, "Darren Brown" wrote:
>
> People,
>
> Interesting, I was talking to Lucio about this sometime ago. I
often
> considered the problem of somebody dropping large rocks on my head
as
> one of the main difficulties with using space resources in Earth
> orbit. It wouldn't take much to have a load swing off course and
> turn a city into a memory and a reason to start a war.

Actually: dropping significantly large objects deliberately into a
gravity well like the Earth's is surprisingly difficult - you need a
direct hit... a mere miss won't do - & doing it in such a way that you
don't give away your intentions anything from months to centuries in
advance.

Robert

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, Marcel Williams
>
> MW: Hollowing out asteroids would be a waste or
> resources. You could probably build dozens of space
> islands with with the materials you hollowed out from
> the asteroid in the first place.

Of course: that's the point which starts making asteroid mining
viable. The asteroid you originally begin mining becomes your factory
floor; with a microG environment down the central spine & a revolving
colony with useable G on the outer edges. It exports power from solar
panels manufactured in situ; & builds the kind of large sail
structures required for next stage space development.

It's called leveraging your asset; & the only way that anything
ressembling commercial spacemining will make sense.

> And industrializing
> the surfaces of the Moon and Mars make far more
> economic sense than trying to build large space
> islands at this time. Their time will come. But their
> time is definitely not in the next 20 or 30 years,
> IMO.
>
> Marcel F. Williams
> 1/4/01

As previously discussed, Mars is a joke as a potential space
industrial site; but the Moon works as a potential link between
different space utilities. Ultimately, though, the resources are in
the asteroids; & the most portable ones - again: assuming you need to
move them; which won't necessarily be true - ar the Earthgrazers
resonant on Earth orbit.

Robert

--- Robert Clements
> --- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, Marcel Williams
>
> wrote:
> >
> > MW: Hollowing out asteroids would be a waste or
> > resources. You could probably build dozens of
> space
> > islands with with the materials you hollowed out
> from
> > the asteroid in the first place.
>
> Of course: that's the point which starts making
> asteroid mining
> viable. The asteroid you originally begin mining
> becomes your factory
> floor; with a microG environment down the central
> spine & a revolving
> colony with useable G on the outer edges. It exports
> power from solar
> panels manufactured in situ; & builds the kind of
> large sail
> structures required for next stage space
> development.
>
> It's called leveraging your asset; & the only way
> that anything
> ressembling commercial spacemining will make sense.
>
> > And industrializing
> > the surfaces of the Moon and Mars make far more
> > economic sense than trying to build large space
> > islands at this time. Their time will come. But
> their
> > time is definitely not in the next 20 or 30 years,
> > IMO.
> >
> > Marcel F. Williams
> > 1/4/01
>
> As previously discussed, Mars is a joke as a
> potential space
> industrial site; but the Moon works as a potential
> link between
> different space utilities. Ultimately, though, the
> resources are in
> the asteroids; & the most portable ones - again:
> assuming you need to
> move them; which won't necessarily be true - ar the
> Earthgrazers
> resonant on Earth orbit.
>
> Robert
>
MW: Again, Mars orbit is an excellent place for the
processing of imported asteroids on a massive scale.
But your askin' for trouble if you allow every Joe
company in the world to import asteroids within the
Terra-Luna system. Would you trust Russian companies,
Chinese companies, Japanese companies, Brazilian
companies-- a company from Texas-- to safely import
hundreds of asteroids every year into the Terra-Luna
system. Sure it could be done but why take unnecessary
risk-- when you don't have to?

Marcel F. Williams
1/5/01

From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]

MW: Again, the politics of the protestors would be
minor compared to the financial cost of insurance.

I'm not so sure. If insurance companies want to stay in business, they
calculate their risks based on hard and fast numbers, and not on public
hysteria. I think their charges would be based on the actual risks,
calculated scientifically, rather than on the kind of grossly inflated
perception of the risk by a largely scientifically illiterate public which I
must agree will probably be the case.

And
with many different companys from many different
countries, you're also going to have to deal with the
possibility of terrorism. Send a few 1000 tonne plus
asteroids with the power of thermonuclear weapons in
the direction of Israel or some other country might
kill a few million people. Would Israel trust an
Iraqi, Iranian, or Saudi Arabian asteroid minining
company? Any country, or company, that could
transport 1000 tonne plus asteroids would instantly
have the power of mass distruction. And the ability to
kill millions. As a potential hazard, it would be far
more dangerous than the nuclear power industry.

This reminds me of the kind of arguments Carl Sagan was making against
asteroid moving in "Pale Blue Dot". James Oberg (quite correctly in my
opinion) refuted his argument (in a nutshell: arranging a collision is a
much more protracted process than arranging a miss).

I thought Darren Brown made an excellent point regarding the fact that it
couldn't very well be a sneak attack, given the difficulties in large last
minute changes in course. And that anything other than a sneak attack
probably wouldn't work.

However, you can avoid all of this by only allowing
small asteroids to be transported to worlds not near
the terra-luna system such as Mars, Mercury, Venus.

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this point. To my mind, the
fact that some people will be nervous about others bringing asteroids into
cislunar space does not inevitably lead to the conclusion that Mars will
become the economic center of space manufacturing. To me, that's going to
be as close to your markets as you can get, and that's initially going to be
near-Earth space.

Another point is that if the argument is that we can't send asteroids to the
Earth because the Earth is an inhabited place so we'll send them to Mars
instead, and if this is then expected to make Mars a hub of economic
activity, then Mars will become an inhabited place, undermining the first
part of the argument.

> MiKe Combs: Personally, I would vote for
transporting asteroidal
> resources to either L-4
> or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
> educating the populace
> that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the
> moon would not pose a
> significant danger to the Earth.
>
MW: That worked wonderfully for the nuclear power
industry in America which has put that industry almost
out of business in the states.

While agreeing that the public's perception of the dangers of nuclear power
probably played a role, I think it was primarily Chernobyl which sounded the
death-knell for nuclear.

But I take your point that public education in scientific and technical
matters is difficult and not always successful. It just pains me to think
that one of the results of the horrific imagery of "Deep Impact" and
"Armageddon" is that no one will ever be permitted to import asteroidal ore
into cislunar space, because I think that's vital to sustaining an
extraterrestrial economy.

There is no doubt in my mind that the manufacturing
and launching of satellites from the surface of the
moon will ignite space industrialization.

The NASA studies on space manufacturing concluded that the manufacturing
should take place in HEO, not on the lunar surface.

But the moon
lacks affordable access to elements like hydrogen,
carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, that are essential in the
manufacturing process. Mars has all of these and and
also a significantly lower gravity well than the
earth and could transport these elements into orbit
and then by light sail to lunar orbit far more cheaply
than transporting them from the surface of the earth.

Cheaper than from the Earth, perhaps, but I doubt cheaper than from NEOs.
Do you allow that people on the Earth might tolerate tanks of methane and
ammonia from a NEO mine to be imported to HEO to supplement lunar resources,
or do you think this too will be judged too dangerous to be permitted?

The industrialization of the Moon will not be
sucessful unless we also industrialize Mars, IMO.

I don't anticipate significant industrialization of Mars for all the reasons
Gerard O'Neill provided us. It doesn't offer any resources that aren't
better obtained from NEOs. The advantage you offer for Mars is that it's
not presently inhabited by people who will object to the importation of
asteroids, but to me that's not enough.

And
the cheapest place to transport and process small
asteroids would be in Mars orbit because the surface
of Mars which is as large as all the land area on
Earth could support easily support millions of people
who could operate remote controled orbital asteroid
processing stations from the marsian surface.

This seems to proceed from the assumption that it will be easier to sustain
people on the surface of Mars than it will in orbit. This is a very
widespread assumption, but I always question it when I see it.

If we're now envisioning a Mars with many millions of people, when do we
reach the point when the Martians say, "You can't steer that asteroid toward
Mars, it's too dangerous!"?

And I
think Mars will dominate asteroid processing in the
solar system until cosmodromes finally come to
dominate this industry in the 22nd century.

I don't see a reason why orbital habitats can't work this industry from the
beginning, given the numerous advantages of an orbital location.

MW: In the long run, it would be even cheaper just to
build the telescopes out of asteroid material. But
again, machines do have problems on occassion and it
would be much cheaper to walk or ride down to a nearby
telescope on the moon near your lunar base than to
take a rocket into orbit.

I don't think repairing such a telescope would involve taking a rocket into
orbit. I think it would involve a space settler from the same habitat which
built the telescope in the first place boarding a space transporter, and
covering the dozen or so miles which might separate the telescope from the
habitat.

MW: There will never be any large O'Neill type space
settlements until you first industrialize the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids, IMO.

I'd agree with you in the case of the moon (at least in a mining development
sense), but I tend to leave Mars off my list. It would be nice to have
asteroidal resources from the get-go, but the NASA studies concluded that
around 99% of the mass of an orbital habitat could be derived from the moon.
(SSI came up with similar percentages for SPS built from lunar materials.)
So I don't think development of asteroids must necessarily precede
development of the first orbital habitats. Having said that, I'd go on to
say the sooner we can get into asteroid resource retrieval, the better.

And once you begin to
manufacture them, its going to take at least a century
before such artificial worlds have a significant
impact on the humanity to significantly reduce human
populations on Earth.

Certainly true, but I was only talking about a person being "onsite" as it
were to service an orbital telescope. This wouldn't require putting a dent
in Earth's population. It wouldn't even require an O'Neill type habitat,
just someone being available from the same Space Manufacturing Facility
(sometimes called the "construction shack") which built the telescope in the
first place.

But without industrializing the
moon, Mars, and the asteroids, it is unlikely that
such space islands will ever come true, IMO.

You may yet turn out to be right, but I expect industrial development in
near Earth space to precede industrial development on other planets or in
the Asteroid Belt, simply because the initial market is going to be near
Earth.

Regards,

Mike Combs

From:
Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
MW: Again, the politics of the protestors would be
minor compared to the financial cost of insurance.

I'm not so sure. If insurance companies want to stay in business, they calculate their risks based on hard and fast numbers, and not on public hysteria. I think their charges would be based on the actual risks, calculated scientifically, rather than on the kind of grossly inflated perception of the risk by a largely scientifically illiterate public which I must agree will probably be the case.
And
with many different companys from many different
countries, you're also going to have to deal with the
possibility of terrorism. Send a few 1000 tonne plus
asteroids with the power of thermonuclear weapons in
the direction of Israel or some other country might
kill a few million people. Would Israel trust an
Iraqi, Iranian, or Saudi Arabian asteroid minining
company? Any country, or company, that could
transport 1000 tonne plus asteroids would instantly
have the power of mass distruction. And the ability to
kill millions. As a potential hazard, it would be far
more dangerous than the nuclear power industry.

This reminds me of the kind of arguments Carl Sagan was making against asteroid moving in "Pale Blue Dot". James Oberg (quite correctly in my opinion) refuted his argument (in a nutshell: arranging a collision is a much more protracted process than arranging a miss).

I thought Darren Brown made an excellent point regarding the fact that it couldn't very well be a sneak attack, given the difficulties in large last minute changes in course. And that anything other than a sneak attack probably wouldn't work.
However, you can avoid all of this by only allowing
small asteroids to be transported to worlds not near
the terra-luna system such as Mars, Mercury, Venus.

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this point. To my mind, the fact that some people will be nervous about others bringing asteroids into cislunar space does not inevitably lead to the conclusion that Mars will become the economic center of space manufacturing. To me, that's going to be as close to your markets as you can get, and that's initially going to be near-Earth space.

Another point is that if the argument is that we can't send asteroids to the Earth because the Earth is an inhabited place so we'll send them to Mars instead, and if this is then expected to make Mars a hub of economic activity, then Mars will become an inhabited place, undermining the first part of the argument.
> MiKe Combs: Personally, I would vote for
transporting asteroidal
> resources to either L-4
> or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
> educating the populace
> that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of the
> moon would not pose a
> significant danger to the Earth.
>
MW: That worked wonderfully for the nuclear power
industry in America which has put that industry almost
out of business in the states.

While agreeing that the public's perception of the dangers of nuclear power probably played a role, I think it was primarily Chernobyl which sounded the death-knell for nuclear.

But I take your point that public education in scientific and technical matters is difficult and not always successful. It just pains me to think that one of the results of the horrific imagery of "Deep Impact" and "Armageddon" is that no one will ever be permitted to import asteroidal ore into cislunar space, because I think that's vital to sustaining an extraterrestrial economy.
There is no doubt in my mind that the manufacturing
and launching of satellites from the surface of the
moon will ignite space industrialization.

The NASA studies on space manufacturing concluded that the manufacturing should take place in HEO, not on the lunar surface.

But the moon
lacks affordable access to elements like hydrogen,
carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, that are essential in the
manufacturing process. Mars has all of these and and
also a significantly lower gravity well than the
earth and could transport these elements into orbit
and then by light sail to lunar orbit far more cheaply
than transporting them from the surface of the earth.

Cheaper than from the Earth, perhaps, but I doubt cheaper than from NEOs. Do you allow that people on the Earth might tolerate tanks of methane and ammonia from a NEO mine to be imported to HEO to supplement lunar resources, or do you think this too will be judged too dangerous to be permitted?

The industrialization of the Moon will not be
sucessful unless we also industrialize Mars, IMO.

I don't anticipate significant industrialization of Mars for all the reasons Gerard O'Neill provided us. It doesn't offer any resources that aren't better obtained from NEOs. The advantage you offer for Mars is that it's not presently inhabited by people who will object to the importation of asteroids, but to me that's not enough.

And
the cheapest place to transport and process small
asteroids would be in Mars orbit because the surface
of Mars which is as large as all the land area on
Earth could support easily support millions of people
who could operate remote controled orbital asteroid
processing stations from the marsian surface.

This seems to proceed from the assumption that it will be easier to sustain people on the surface of Mars than it will in orbit. This is a very widespread assumption, but I always question it when I see it.

If we're now envisioning a Mars with many millions of people, when do we reach the point when the Martians say, "You can't steer that asteroid toward Mars, it's too dangerous!"?

And I
think Mars will dominate asteroid processing in the
solar system until cosmodromes finally come to
dominate this industry in the 22nd century.

I don't see a reason why orbital habitats can't work this industry from the beginning, given the numerous advantages of an orbital location.
MW: In the long run, it would be even cheaper just to
build the telescopes out of asteroid material. But
again, machines do have problems on occassion and it
would be much cheaper to walk or ride down to a nearby
telescope on the moon near your lunar base than to
take a rocket into orbit.

I don't think repairing such a telescope would involve taking a rocket into orbit. I think it would involve a space settler from the same habitat which built the telescope in the first place boarding a space transporter, and covering the dozen or so miles which might separate the telescope from the habitat.
MW: There will never be any large O'Neill type space
settlements until you first industrialize the Moon,
Mars, and the asteroids, IMO.

I'd agree with you in the case of the moon (at least in a mining development sense), but I tend to leave Mars off my list. It would be nice to have asteroidal resources from the get-go, but the NASA studies concluded that around 99% of the mass of an orbital habitat could be derived from the moon. (SSI came up with similar percentages for SPS built from lunar materials.) So I don't think development of asteroids must necessarily precede development of the first orbital habitats. Having said that, I'd go on to say the sooner we can get into asteroid resource retrieval, the better.

And once you begin to
manufacture them, its going to take at least a century
before such artificial worlds have a significant
impact on the humanity to significantly reduce human
populations on Earth.

Certainly true, but I was only talking about a person being "onsite" as it were to service an orbital telescope. This wouldn't require putting a dent in Earth's population. It wouldn't even require an O'Neill type habitat, just someone being available from the same Space Manufacturing Facility (sometimes called the "construction shack") which built the telescope in the first place.

But without industrializing the
moon, Mars, and the asteroids, it is unlikely that
such space islands will ever come true, IMO.

You may yet turn out to be right, but I expect industrial development in near Earth space to precede industrial development on other planets or in the Asteroid Belt, simply because the initial market is going to be near Earth.

Regards,
Mike Combs

From: Tom Tucker (Olympia) [mailto:tntucker@...]
Sent: Thursday, January 04, 2001 10:18 PM
To: spacesettlers@egroups.com
Subject: Re: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use

So, you see, we are technologically ready for Mars, and to colonize Mars,
but we lack technology for a massive space colony.

The NASA studies of the 70's (and assuming 70's technology) reached a much
different conclusion.

I'd certainly agree that we can send people to Mars for far less than it
would take to colonize space, but they shouldn't be compared as the results
are so different. We should only compare the price tag for colonizing space
with the tag for colonizing Mars.

I'd disagree that we currently have the technology to colonize Mars, but
lack the technology needed to colonize space. To me, the technological
difficulties are much the same: building up industrial infrastructure from
scratch, engineering a large pressure vessel, and setting up and managing a
closed ecology. The only things Mars provides naturally which must be
provided artificially in orbit is a day/night cycle, and gravity. In a
space settlement, these would be provided via large flimsy mirrors and
rotation, and I don't see either of these as being beyond our capabilities.

Regards,

Mike Combs

From:
Tom Tucker (Olympia) [mailto:tntucker@...]
Sent:
Thursday, January 04, 2001 10:18 PM
To:
spacesettlers@egroups.com
Subject:
Re: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use

So, you see, we are technologically ready for Mars, and to colonize Mars, but we lack technology for a massive space colony.

The NASA studies of the 70's (and assuming 70's technology) reached a much different conclusion.

I'd certainly agree that we can send people to Mars for far less than it would take to colonize space, but they shouldn't be compared as the results are so different. We should only compare the price tag for colonizing space with the tag for colonizing Mars.

I'd disagree that we currently have the technology to colonize Mars, but lack the technology needed to colonize space. To me, the technological difficulties are much the same: building up industrial infrastructure from scratch, engineering a large pressure vessel, and setting up and managing a closed ecology. The only things Mars provides naturally which must be provided artificially in orbit is a day/night cycle, and gravity. In a space settlement, these would be provided via large flimsy mirrors and rotation, and I don't see either of these as being beyond our capabilities.

Regards,
Mike Combs

The same breakthroughs are nened for any mars mission. Where do you
think the mars habitat is going to come from. Its will be shipped with
the mars colonists. Do you think people are going to walk out witha
wheel barrel and pick on the surface of mars?

To get to mars you would have to build a starship the size of the
international space station at a minimum, develop space agriculture,
build power satellites, design and build low acceleration engines.

In fact you would have to build a large section of the space
infrastructure you need for space settlements before you even think of
starting to move it towards mars.

If we could go to mars today, we can start building space settlements
today.

Bill

> It may be wise not to shut-out any colonization effort (i.e. planet
vs. colony vs star) since the economics and political will in the
future will make the final decision. You see, Mike, we could send a
mission to Mars with current technology and around 50 billion
dollars. We could do marvelous things on Mars for only 10% of the
defense budget, but what could we do in space colonization for the
same amount? Two major technological breakthroughs are needed IMO:
> 1) Much lower launch costs, and
> 2) Advanced telerobotics to mine, manufacture and assemble
fabrications in space remotely from a space station or from a planet
such as Earth or Mars. Mars, with it's closer proximity to the
asteroid belt, may be better suited part of time when Earth is on the
far side of the sun from the asteroid in question. Naturally, if you
can transport the asteroid to orbit around Earth, then this would only
leave the issue of huge rockets to transport the asteroid.
>
> So, you see, we are technologically ready for Mars, and to colonize
Mars, but we lack technology for a massive space colony.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Tom
> From: Combs, Mike
> To: 'spacesettlers@egroups.com'
> Sent: Thursday, January 04, 2001 1:12 PM
> Subject: RE: [spacesettlers] Asteroid use
>
> From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@y...]
>
> MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
> of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
> would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> companys to do this. What about asteroid
> transportation companies based in third world
> countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
> than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
> look trivial.
>
> Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
> resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
> little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
> 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
> be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
> materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
> I'll be the first to admit that protests from self-styled
"eco-activist" who aren't good at math will be a major hurtle to
overcome. But I have a hard time getting from "Protesters will scream
if you so much as bring an asteroid into cislunar space" to
"Logically, Mars is the best place to build satellites from asteroidal
resources". If the market for these satellites is an Earth market,
that to me means the logical place to build them is HEO, where your
workforce is much closer to Earth.
>
> Maybe rather than bringing in asteroids whole, perhaps we should
only bring in greater numbers of multiple loads of ore, each of which
would be too small to do major damage even if it did strike the
Earth. Alternately, one could propose building the satellites in the
Belt, and only importing the finished product. At least this would
reduce the tonnage being nudged toward Earth, but one could skip the
step of the stopover at Mars.
>
> Personally, I would vote for transporting asteroidal resources to
either L-4 or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
educating the populace that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of
the moon would not pose a significant danger to the Earth.
>
> But if we're talking an Earth orbit market, I wouldn't expect Main
Belt resources to be used at all. I'd sooner expect use of NEOs, and
lunar resources. I have no doubt that Main Belt asteroids will be
used, but I think they'll be used in place, by folks living
permanently in the Belt.
>
> Please forgive me, but this just strikes me as an attempt to
involve Mars out of a sense of romance, with no real consideration of
the value Mars adds to this process. I'd have thought that anyone on
this maillist would be familiar with the work of Gerard O'Neill, the
main thrust of which was that planets are not the best places for
expanding industrial civilizations. Personally, I think Mars is going
to have much less to do with the industrialization or settlement of
space than what most people tend to think.
> MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon.
> I'm assuming use of lunar resources to build them (provided that
we're talking about really giant telescopes). In that case, the only
added expense would be the cost of lifting the resources out of the
lunar gravity well. O'Neill calculated that his mass driver could do
this for pennies a pound. It's also likely that manufacturing
processes in HEO will be less expensive than on the lunar surface due
to the constant availability of sunlight. It's even possible that
access to 0 G may have benefits. I don't think the difference in
price tags would be all that much, and the added flexibility of being
able to point wherever you want might be worth something.
>
> Also, a telescope built in 0 G could be even bigger and flimsier
than what would be possible in 1/6th G.
> And
> lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> there would be people there already. A space telescope
> would be a lot more expensive to repair.
> Why assume that there would be people available on the lunar
surface, but not in HEO? I thought this was the Space Settler's
maillist, where we were taking it for granted that there are going to
be space settlements.
>
> If we want to talk about transportation costs to and from Earth,
obviously they are less for HEO than for the lunar surface.
> MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
> diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
> since they would be to heavy to transport into a
> planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
> to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
> if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
> would be very high since you would have to find people
> willing to work in isolation in such environments.
>
> Ceres is a C-type of asteroid that probably has all of
> the elements required for an industrial society in
> abundance. And with a gravity well below that of even
> the moon, it would be extremely cheap to transport
> materials off its surface. And being the largest
> asteroid would mean that many companys could
> congregate there to exploit its resources. And that
> would mean hundreds, possibly even tens of thousands,
> of people working on its surface or in orbit around
> the asteroid. So there would be much less of a feeling
> of isolation with so many others also working there.
> And Ceres would have the equivalent resources of
> approximately 1 million 1 kilometer asteroids-- all in
> one place. Ceres is clearly the motherload of
> asteroids. And only those asteroids that you could
> transport by lightsail would be cheaper to exploit,
> IMO, than the largest asteroids.
> OK, I think I see your argument now. Yes, there might be some
synergistic advantage to clustering our facilities and settlements.

From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]

MW: Hollowing out asteroids would be a waste or
resources. You could probably build dozens of space
islands with with the materials you hollowed out from
the asteroid in the first place.

I wholeheartedly agree with you here. O'Neill type habitats represent an
incredible economy of mass.

And industrializing
the surfaces of the Moon and Mars make far more
economic sense than trying to build large space
islands at this time. Their time will come. But their
time is definitely not in the next 20 or 30 years,
IMO.

Well I'd have to agree with your last sentence, if only for the reason that
NASA estimated it would take 22 year to build the first habitat (and I'd
consider 30 years probably closer to the reality).

But I'd question if the industrial development of Mars lies in the next 30
years either.

Regards,

Mike Combs

From:
Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
MW: Hollowing out asteroids would be a waste or
resources. You could probably build dozens of space
islands with with the materials you hollowed out from
the asteroid in the first place.

I wholeheartedly agree with you here. O'Neill type habitats represent an incredible economy of mass.

And industrializing
the surfaces of the Moon and Mars make far more
economic sense than trying to build large space
islands at this time. Their time will come. But their
time is definitely not in the next 20 or 30 years,
IMO.

Well I'd have to agree with your last sentence, if only for the reason that NASA estimated it would take 22 year to build the first habitat (and I'd consider 30 years probably closer to the reality).

But I'd question if the industrial development of Mars lies in the next 30 years either.
Regards,
Mike Combs

1000 tonnes at 40 km/s

ke= 1/2 m v^2
= (1/2) (10^6 kg) (40000)^2
= (5x10^5)(1.6x10^9)
= (8x10^14) J
1 tonne of TNT ~ 10^12 J

so your 1000 tonnes will hit the ground with the explosive power of
1000 tonnes of tnt. Big - yes. But its not 2.5 megatonnes.

Bill

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, "Tom Tucker (Olympia)"
wrote:
>
> From: bill t
> To: spacesettlers@egroups.com
> Sent: Thursday, January 04, 2001 8:34 PM
> Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Asteroid use
>
> >
> > MW: If a 1000 tonne asteroid being transported to
> > earth were to hit the Earth it would be the equivalent
> > of a 2.5 megaton nuclear weapon. Obviously, such
> > asteroids could be safely placed into Earth orbit. But
> > would you trust dozens, if not hundreds of private
> > companys to do this. What about asteroid
> > transportation companies based in third world
> > countries. An asteroid disaster would be a lot bigger
> > than some damaged Liberian oil tanker. And the
> > insurance cost would be-- astronomical-- if we
> > attempted to place these asteroids in Earth orbit or
> > even in Lunar orbit, IMO. And the environmental
> > protest would make the anti-nuclear protest of 1970's
> > look trivial.
> >
>
> a 1000 tonnes of steel is equal to a cube 5m on a side. A meteor
> that big will produce a crater maybe 50 m in diameter. Its not
equal
> to a 2.5 megaton nuclear bomb. If you thin it is, I would like to
see
> the numbers to back it up.
>
> Bill,
> I think we are getting in over our heads if we continue to
speculate without using hard numbers for grounding.
> A thousand tons of steel traveling at 20KM/s will certainly create
a crater larger than 50 meters! You must specify your assumed
velocity in order to be credible. An asteroid may enter Earth's
atmosphere anywhere from 1KM/s to over 40 KM/s if retrograde. You must
calculate the kenetic energy at 1/2MV2 and then convert to the
equivalent tons of dynamite to get an idea of the damage that would be
done.
>
> Cheers,
> Tom
>
> > Mars, however, also has practically all of the natural
> > resources necessary for human survival. And a much
> > lower gravity well than the Earth. And there would be
> > little protest about transporting hundreds of 1000 to
> > 10,000 tonne asteroids into Marsian orbit every year
> > to be processed. The satellite market is estimated to
> > be worth about 20 trillion dollars in the next 20
> > years. The manufacturing of satellites out of asteroid
> > materials in Mars orbit would allow Mars to dominate
> > this potential 20 trillion dollar industry.
> >
>
> Mars has none of the infrastructure ready, has no people for a
market.
> The moon would be a cheaper course than mars.
>
> The $20 trillion satellite market everyone is talking about the
total
> value, not the value of the satellites. It includes the
comminucation
> value, the weather predicting value, and perhaps even power. It
isn't
> 'the earth's population is going to spend 20 trillion on satellite
> manufacturing'.
>
> > >
> > MW: Orbital telescopes would be a lot more expensive
> > than lunar telescopes manufactured on the moon. And
> > lunar telescopes would be easier to maintain because
> > there would be people there already. A space telescope
> > would be a lot more expensive to repair.
> >
>
> There are big assumptions being made here. How many people live on
the
> moon today? My belief is that where ever humans settle, that is
where
> the telescopes will be built.
>
> > > MW: But as far as sending humans out to the asteroid
> > > belt, it is obvious that the first place they should
> > > go would be to Ceres, the largest of the asteroids.
> > > Because of its large size (more than 2.7 million
> > > square kilometers of surface area) and its extremely
> > > low gravity, Ceres may well be the most valuable
>
> The most obvious place to go is an asteroid that is deliberately
> captured into earths orbit. in 1997 a asteriod was found that had
> passed between earth and the moon about a month earlier. Had this
> asteroid been found a month before its closest approach a project
to
> help the earth capture it was possible, and we had instant access
to
> space material a mere 50 000 km away.
>
> Does nasa have such a plan on the books?
>
> > >
> > MW: Asteroids only 1 kilometer to 100 kilometers in
> > diameter would probably be the most difficult to mine
> > since they would be to heavy to transport into a
> > planetary orbit and might be too small and to rugged
> > to set up large facilities on its surface-- especially
> > if their rotations are very fast. And the labor cost
> > would be very high since you would have to find people
> > willing to work in isolation in such environments.
> >
> Again this depends on its location. Ceres is further than mars. If
> your going to hit ceres, why not phoebus and demos instead?
>
> The rotation of an asteroid doesn't matter much. You find the line
> through which it is rotating, and start mining along that line.
Once
> you have a deep hole along the axis, you start mining further from
the

You seem to have hidden assumptions in your ideas.

Do you think the industrial complexes needed to mine and fabricate
stuff on the moon and mars are waiting there?

Reality: Everything needed on the moon, mars or in space will
initially have to be brought with the colonist.

Ask yourself, what do you as an individual need to survive on the
moon? What infrastructure must be in place to provide those goods and
services? You will find all three are very similar. That minimum must
be built and launched from earth. Once in low earth orbit, it is 300
000 km to the moon, 200 million km to mars, and 50 000 - 50 million km
for asteroids.

For time schedules, 1 week -1 month for the moon, 2 week wait time for
launch. two years to get to mars, 2 year wait times for launch. 1 week
- 2 years for asteroids, 1 month-5 year wait time.

Bill

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, Marcel Williams

Does anyone realize how big a 1 kilometer in diameter rock is?

Its about 5x10^9 MT of material

Its equal to about a decades worth of mining on earth. The first
asteroid to be brought into earth orbit will be the last one for many
decades.

The AMES study, weighed in a standford torus at 2x10^6 MT. That means
one asteroid could build 2500 standord torii.

The first asteroids we serious look at will be earth grazers 20-50 m
in diameters.

If anyone has some romantic idea of prospector ships scouring the
solar system and bringing back rocks, dream on.

Bill

--- "Combs, Mike" wrote:
> From: Marcel Williams [mailto:newpapyrus@...]
>
> MW: Again, the politics of the protestors would be
> minor compared to the financial cost of insurance.
>
>Mike Combs: I'm not so sure. If insurance companies
want to
> stay in business, they
> calculate their risks based on hard and fast
> numbers, and not on public
> hysteria. I think their charges would be based on
> the actual risks,
> calculated scientifically, rather than on the kind
> of grossly inflated
> perception of the risk by a largely scientifically
> illiterate public which I
> must agree will probably be the case.

MW: I'm sure you could make a good scientific argument
that it is perfectly safe in these days of energy
shortages to put a small nuclear power plant in every
downtown area in America. But its never going to
happen. The solution should have been to build large
numbers of inherently safe nuclear power plants in--
remotely located-- areas to produce synthetic fuels
like hydrogen, methane, and methanol that could have
been easily distributed by pipline to other regions of
the country. But the politically ignorant nuclear
industry saw no reason why they should do that and now
the nuclear power industry in America is nearly
extinct.

>
> Mike Combs: And
> with many different companys from many different
> countries, you're also going to have to deal with
> the
> possibility of terrorism. Send a few 1000 tonne plus
> asteroids with the power of thermonuclear weapons in
> the direction of Israel or some other country might
> kill a few million people. Would Israel trust an
> Iraqi, Iranian, or Saudi Arabian asteroid minining
> company? Any country, or company, that could
> transport 1000 tonne plus asteroids would instantly
> have the power of mass distruction. And the ability
> to
> kill millions. As a potential hazard, it would be
> far
> more dangerous than the nuclear power industry.
>
> Mike Combs: This reminds me of the kind of arguments
Carl Sagan
> was making against
> asteroid moving in "Pale Blue Dot". James Oberg
> (quite correctly in my
> opinion) refuted his argument (in a nutshell:
> arranging a collision is a
> much more protracted process than arranging a miss).
>
> I thought Darren Brown made an excellent point
> regarding the fact that it
> couldn't very well be a sneak attack, given the
> difficulties in large last
> minute changes in course. And that anything other
> than a sneak attack
> probably wouldn't work.

MW: The simple threat could invite suits from third
world governments that have no space capability or
from international green parties around the world.
And while your dealing with suits and temporary bans
and rising insurance cost on your asteroid imports
into the Terra-Luna system, we on Mars will be happily
importing and processing asteroids in Mars orbit and
shipping our products to Earth and the moon by light
sail at less than a dollar per kilogram. However, if
we manufacture our light sails out of asteroid
material our shipping cost may eventually fall to a
penny per kilogram. We might be able to transfer a
manufactured ten ton satellite from Mars orbit to--
any Earth orbit-- for as little as $100 and make a
huge profit by charging terrestrial or even lunar
prices for placing satellites in orbit-- while your
still trying to deal with the legacy of Ralph Nader.

>
> MW: However, you can avoid all of this by only
allowing
> small asteroids to be transported to worlds not
> near
> the terra-luna system such as Mars, Mercury, Venus.
>
> Mike Combs: I guess we'll just have to agree to
disagree on this
> point. To my mind, the
> fact that some people will be nervous about others
> bringing asteroids into
> cislunar space does not inevitably lead to the
> conclusion that Mars will
> become the economic center of space manufacturing.
> To me, that's going to
> be as close to your markets as you can get, and
> that's initially going to be
> near-Earth space.

MW: There is really no huge market for oil in the
Middle-East, but they do OK by selling oil to the rest
of the world.
>
> Mike Combs: Another point is that if the argument is
that we
> can't send asteroids to the
> Earth because the Earth is an inhabited place so
> we'll send them to Mars
> instead, and if this is then expected to make Mars a
> hub of economic
> activity, then Mars will become an inhabited place,
> undermining the first
> part of the argument.

MW: Most folks in the US are against drilling for oil
in the Alaska wilderness (including myself)-- except
for the Alaskans themselves. That's because they know
it would make them wealthier. Alaskan citizens already
get paid by the state government from profits from the
Alaskan oil industry. And I'm also sure that the
Marsians who work in the asteroid processing industry
will know the same thing.

Relative to the Earth, Mars is a terrible place to
live (especially because of its low gravity) despite
its romantic portrayal in the literature. I'm sure
that there are many people who would love to visit the
planet Mars. But few who would want to live there
forever. But it is still a much easier place to live
than on the Moon, Mercury, or even the asteroid Ceres.
But if Mars orbit becomes the central hub for
asteroid importation and processing, Mars will be the
best place in the solar system to make money. And I
imagine that most folks who work there will only do so
for about 4 or 5 years until they've made their
fortune in the asteriod processing industry and return
to Earth with their fortune much like the Carribean
plantation owners from Britain in the 18th and 19th
centuries. But, of course, there will always be those
who want to stay in such a strange place.
>
> > MiKe Combs: Personally, I would vote for
> transporting asteroidal
> > resources to either L-4
> > or L-5, which are stable on all 3 axis, and simply
> > educating the populace
> > that bringing in an asteroid at the distance of
> the
> > moon would not pose a
> > significant danger to the Earth.
> >
> MW: That worked wonderfully for the nuclear power
> industry in America which has put that industry
> almost
> out of business in the states.
>
> Mike Combs: While agreeing that the public's
perception of the
> dangers of nuclear power
> probably played a role, I think it was primarily
> Chernobyl which sounded the
> death-knell for nuclear.
>
MW: Yet folks have no inhibitions about greeting their
loved ones when a nuclear aircraft carrier arrives
which is far more dangerous than any commercial
nuclear power facility.

>Mike Combs: But I take your point that public
education in
> scientific and technical
> matters is difficult and not always successful. It
> just pains me to think
> that one of the results of the horrific imagery of
> "Deep Impact" and
> "Armageddon" is that no one will ever be permitted
> to import asteroidal ore
> into cislunar space, because I think that's vital to
> sustaining an
> extraterrestrial economy.
>
MW: Importing processed asteroid materials from Mars
by light sail could be as cheap as 1 dollar to 1 cent
per kilogram. And there would be much less fear as
automated light sails brought in larger asteroids into
marsian orbit possibly up to 100,000 tonnes in mass.
But each significant increase in asteroid mass into
the Terra-Luna system would initiate another round of
political controversy.

> MW: There is no doubt in my mind that the
manufacturing
> and launching of satellites from the surface of the
> moon will ignite space industrialization.
>
>Mike Combs: The NASA studies on space manufacturing
concluded
> that the manufacturing
> should take place in HEO, not on the lunar surface.
>
MW: Is this the same NASA that has failed to give us a
reusable heavy lift vehicle or aresuable aerospace
transportation system that could take off from any
airport. Or the NASA that has put all of its eggs into
the overly expensive International Space Station. The
presidentially appointed National Commission on Space
back in 1986 who had members such as Neil Armstrong,
Luis Alvarez, Thomas Paine, Jeane Kirkpatrick, and
Gerard O'Neill and congressional advisors such as John
Glenn recommended the establishment of premanent
human facilities on the Moon and Mars and rotating
space stations. But the US congress had other ideas.

> MW: But the moon
> lacks affordable access to elements like hydrogen,
> carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, that are essential in
> the
> manufacturing process. Mars has all of these and and
> also a significantly lower gravity well than the
> earth and could transport these elements into orbit
> and then by light sail to lunar orbit far more
> cheaply
> than transporting them from the surface of the
> earth.
>
> Mike Combs: Cheaper than from the Earth, perhaps,
but I doubt
> cheaper than from NEOs.

MW: It cheaper to launch an expeditions to the
asteroids from the surface of the Moon or Mars than
from the surface of the Earth.

> Mike Combs: Do you allow that people on the Earth
might tolerate
> tanks of methane and
> ammonia from a NEO mine to be imported to HEO to
> supplement lunar resources,
> or do you think this too will be judged too
> dangerous to be permitted?
>
MW: Tankers of liquid methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and
chlorine under a 1000 tonnes would probably vaporize
and explode in the upper atmosphere and could easly be
exploded even before they entered the atmosphere. And
smaller cargoes would probably be preferable to larger
cargoes since they could be transported to their
destinations more rapidly. Most lunar companies would
probably rather have their liquid methane delivered
within a few months rather than a few years. So a
cargo less than 1000 tonnes would probably be
preferable. Lightsail transported asteroids, on the
other hand, would probably be between 1000 to 100,000
tonnes in mass, IMO. A far more potentially dangerous
cargoe.

> MW: The industrialization of the Moon will not be
> sucessful unless we also industrialize Mars, IMO.
>
> Mike Combs: I don't anticipate significant
industrialization of
> Mars for all the reasons
> Gerard O'Neill provided us. It doesn't offer any
> resources that aren't
> better obtained from NEOs. The advantage you offer
> for Mars is that it's
> not presently inhabited by people who will object to
> the importation of
> asteroids, but to me that's not enough.
>
MW: It would be much more efficient to process
asteroids at a central location such as Mars than to
send out people to small asteroids. People are
expensive. And because of the harsh conditions they'll
have to indure, the folks that you're going to send
out there are going to charge you big time.

> MW: And
> the cheapest place to transport and process small
> asteroids would be in Mars orbit because the surface
> of Mars which is as large as all the land area on
> Earth could support easily support millions of
> people
> who could operate remote controled orbital asteroid
> processing stations from the marsian surface.
>
> Mike Combs: This seems to proceed from the
assumption that it
> will be easier to sustain
> people on the surface of Mars than it will in orbit.
> This is a very
> widespread assumption, but I always question it when
> I see it.
>
MW: Its easy to convert the carbon dioxide in marsian
atmoshere into breathible air and there's frozenwater
in the soil and at the poles. And ground controled
asteroid processing stations could placed in
aresynchronos orbit. And it would not surprise me that
the first 2 kilometer in diameter O'Neill type of
space colony would be build in Mars orbit, or at
least, in the orbital arc of Mars.

> Mike Combs: If we're now envisioning a Mars with
many millions
> of people, when do we
> reach the point when the Martians say, "You can't
> steer that asteroid toward
> Mars, it's too dangerous!"?
>
MW: Mars will probably be an asteroid industrial power
for less than a century or two, IMO. Because once the
largest O'Neill type of colonies start to be
manufactured and mass produced, practically all
asteroid processing will take place at these
facilities. By the 23rd century, Mars will only be a
tourist attraction full of vast landscapes and the
ghost towns of its former industrial empire. Space
islands will dominate the solar system industrially in
the 23rd century and at least 90 to 95% of the human
population will live permanently on such space
islands, IMO.

> MW: And I
> think Mars will dominate asteroid processing in the
> solar system until cosmodromes finally come to
> dominate this industry in the 22nd century.
>
> Mike Combs: I don't see a reason why orbital
habitats can't work
> this industry from the
> beginning, given the numerous advantages of an
> orbital location.
>

MW: The Moon and Mars are natural space stations with
low gravity wells and room to grow. And they will
give humanity a foothold on cheaply accessing the
natural resources of the solar system.

Marcel F. Williams
1/5/00

MW: The difference between building structures in
space and building structures on Mars is that on Mars
you can live off the land. There is soil and carbon,
hydrogen, nitrogen, and chlorine on Mars but all of
these have to be imported for a large space facility.
And Mars will probably export these chemicals to the
moon for the lunar industries. The industrialization
of the Moon and Mars are the first steps towards the
future affordible construction of space islands, IMO.

Marcel F. Williams
1/5/01
--- bill t wrote: