Asteroid use

--- "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