Mining asteroids, revisited

In light of the new information that I've come across, it may be time to revisit this topic.  In the discussion, which was about 3 weeks ago, I wondered if the mission costs could be reduced and the yields increased.  The purpose of those two price points is to bring it into profitability.  The thought also occurred to me is what if it is true?  What if the costs are always going to be too high to achieve profitability?  I will return to this question later in this brief write up.

One of the baseline assumptions is that the mass of the mining device will be kept under 2000 kg.  One way to lower costs is to make the entire mission dependent upon not increasing that number by very much.  If you did, you can use a smaller, less expensive propulsion method.

It would also pay to be able to make multiple missions with only this one device.  In other words, don't assume a one off mission, but a series of missions.  If each mission can return with an average of 40 million dollars worth of cargo, then the payoff could come after a certain number of missions.

The third way would be in increasing yield.  It would make sense that after a number of missions, a learning curve would favor greater efficiency.  Experience should yield better results.

Now if the costs of the baseline of 600 million can't be brought down that much and if the yield can be brought up, what then?  Is it worth it to subsidize the costs of the mission for the sake of its other benefits?  Is it in the interest of the people to bring back platinum and platinum group metals if bringing them back will provide a new energy source?  What if this energy source was worth more in cost savings than the market value of the metals themselves?

I think the answer to these question is so what, yes, yes, yes.  The answer to that last question is: the market value of platinum is not nearly the value that could be added by having it.  In other words, it would be worth it to subsidize it.  It wouldn't even be necessary for the government to do this.  Private industry could do this in order to bring an automobile to market which would be clean, efficient, and cost effective to own and operate.  That is the promise of this approach, in my opinion.


Update: about 9 am cst

I've been playing around with the idea of using advanced propulsion for the spacecraft to take the mining equipment to an asteroid.   If we assume a total mass of less than 3000 kg, it would arrive at an asteroid in several months. 

Also, I checked out a Falcon 9 rocket's lift capacity.  It could hold 3 such devices along with their propulsion and so forth.  The cost to launch a Falcon 9 is 50 million.  That brings the launch cost for each mining spacecraft down to 17 million or so.  Once the other costs are figured in, just one Falcon mission that launches 3 of these mining missions reaches profitable stage.  If the mining craft can be reused over and over again, it will become very profitable over time. 

How to get the platinum back to Earth?  Pay a manned mission to bring it back when they go back home.  This would help the manned space missions by being able to defray some of their own costs.