Planetary Resources – The Asteroid Mining Company – There’s Platinum in the sea? Maybe

There’s Platinum in the sea? Maybe – lets see!

I’ve been sharing the mission and vision of Planetary Resources with many audiences lately – read about my talks at the University of Alberta or Seattle’s monthly Hacker News meet up.

My favorite part of the presentations are the questions! One that comes up a lot, is the possibility of obtaining precious metals from seawater being easier than asteroid mining.

Lets do some basic calculations to explore this:

The approximate concentration of Platinum in seawater is about 2.34E-10 grams per liter. That’s a 2 with 9 zeros before it, a very small number:

0.000000000234 grams per liter

On the other hand, lets consider how many liters of water there are in the ocean: 1.3E21 liters

That’s a 1 with 21 zeros after it, a very big number!

1,300,000,000,000,000,000,000 liters

Multiply this together, and we end up with approximately 300,000 tonnes of Platinum in the seawater. At today’s price for Platinum (about US$1600 per ounce), this is $16 Trillion, or a $16 million million. That is a kingly sum.

Sounds attractive, right? But now we need to process all the water in all the oceans, and it’s a big task. We’re going to need to pump a lot of water, so lets get a big pump.

How about something Niagra Falls-sized?

Flow rate of Niagra falls: 5.7E6 liters per second.

It would only take 7 million years to work through all the water on Earth (if we had a pump and processing plant that big). This will certainly introduce some other problems. So, lets be a little more reasonable and say we could process 1 millionth of the ocean (1.3E15 liters) in 7 years, with a processing plant with the flow rate of Niagra Falls (still quite a challenge).

We’d then have about 300 kg of Platinum, with a market value of around $16 Million.

Thankfully, in asteroids similar to LL chondrites and iron meteorites that have been studied here on Earth, the concentration of precious metals like Platinum is a BILLION times higher than the ocean.

Conclusion: While asteroid mining is a big task, its much more tractable than processing enormous amounts of seawater!

In a followup, we’ll talk about how the water on carbonaceous asteroids paves the way for a robust space economy!

Chris Lewicki
President & Chief Asteroid Miner

Peter H. Diamandis:

October 31, 2012 at 4:21 pm

I love the calculations Chris Lewicki did here. Brilliant work.

Andre' Smith:
October 31, 2012 at 5:21 pm
I agree Mr. Diamandis... this is on the level of Einstein.
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 5:58 pm
What's most brilliant is the simplicity and directness of it. It addresses the question without any unnecessary complexity or logical steps.
Ben Morrow:
October 31, 2012 at 6:00 pm
They are cool calculations to be sure, but I think you need to read up to learn what Einstein did. He didn't just multiply and divide.
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 6:00 pm
@Ben Morrow: Indeed he didn't, and doing something comparable to what Einstein did here would be unnecessary and simply introduce more possible errors.
Neil Newton:
October 31, 2012 at 7:02 pm
I agree. If the figures used in the calculation are correct, then trying to extract platinum from seawater makes no economic sense whatsoever. Even if you were able to build machinery on the scales referred to, buildng the equipment would probably cost more than the value of the platinum extracted. I think the main point here though, is that mining asteroids for rare materials would play a vital role in expanding our economies and influence beyond Earth; not to mention the spur this would have to technolgy and innovation. At this point in our evolution, widening our influence beyond Earth orbit is something that is probably crucial to our continuance. Not to do so is likely signal the beginning of our decline. Whether we like it or not, this is probably a Universal law.
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 7:07 pm
Neil Newton: Of course let us be careful to avoid a straw man here. Mining actual rocks on the sea-bed may indeed be profitable, but the equipment to do space mining and sea mining would not be the same or require the same assets or resources so why not try building both?
Chris Lewicki:
October 31, 2012 at 11:14 pm
Neil - You've got the point exactly!
Neil Newton:
November 1, 2012 at 11:36 pm
Chris Lewicki Thanks for that. I do think we are at a pivotal moment in our evolution. The similarities with previous civilisations are striking. They reach the limits of their influence and then go into decline. The difference now though is that we are not talking about regional civilsations, we are talking about a global civilisation; and nature, I think is laying down the challenge. The consequence of ignoring this challenge could be catastrophic. There will be enormous technical difficulties ahead, but I wish you guys all the success, because not taking up the challenge of beginning our dispersal beyond Earth will leave us with difficulties we don't really want to be thinking about.
Craig Foulds:
November 2, 2012 at 9:58 am
Seawater processing might be worthwhile if you knew where to look. The equivalent of a uranium or platinum brine pool-- that is something worth looking into.

I'm skeptical about that number, 2e-10 grams/liter. Was this taken from seafloor concentrations? Did a NOAA scientist take a cup from the surface? The ocean does not have a uniform concentration of salts or aqueous metals. Those numbers are completely right for what is being cited frequently as reasons for or against seawater mining, and Mr. Lewicki is spot on in pointing out the absurdity and lack of realism there. It's good quantitative contextual math.

I would love some better numbers. Asteroid mining will return a substantial amount of heavy metals in probably 20 years, other useful materials to LEO, water and volatiles, probably in 10. The result enables expansion beyond Earth, which is priceless. However, I don't think it should be used as an argument against seawater mining. I think it is more prudent, even though this case specifically concerns mining platinum, to treat the products of asteroid mining and seawater mining separately. I can't help but see an agenda behind this calculation.
Elpis Expectation:
November 4, 2012 at 9:20 pm
I don't know who compared sifting through Earth's water for platinum mining against exploring asteroids but it sounds awfully contrived. It's far easier to drill deeper into the Earth's crust, that companies have barely even scratched the surface of, than it is to mess with the water in the oceans. But the effort and amount of money involved to create a hole the size of a country so that the equipment can dig deep enough is far larger than the enterprise of capturing meteors from space for metals or water, by and large. In fact, space exploration has some really fortunate points going for it: it can be done with a fraction of the number of people it takes to mine traditionally here on Earth. No unions, no strikes to halt supply.
Andre' Smith:
November 6, 2012 at 6:23 pm
Ben Morrow, looks like you are growing a following. Are you saying that I am overstating the relation of brilliance between Einstein & Lewicki? Based on your two Einstein quotes on your FB page... Lewicki is clearly the superior and if this is what I need to look towards reading to get a better feel of Einstein then perhaps you may need to join another forum along with your supporters.
Elpis Expectation:
December 20, 2012 at 2:55 am
What is multiplication and division besides a different way to add and to subtract?
Bill Drummond:
January 13, 2013 at 9:45 pm
looks like you guys have settled in to doing the grunt work now.

Nick Conner:

October 31, 2012 at 5:44 pm

Something that jumps out to me...our systems here on earth are often tightly linked. Weather, geology, ecology. Do we have any idea what the impact of removing large quantities of platinum from the Ocean? Are there ecosystems that directly or indirectly leverage the platinum concentration? If I'm remembering my chemistry days correctly (might not be) platinum can serve as a catalyst - is this a factor in reactions that occur on our oceans? Especially considering these calculations in the post, it seems a lot smarter to me to grab resources from external sources rather than mess with the massive systems in place on Earth.

Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 6:09 pm
Yes you would have to consider both chemical and thermal results. My guess is the thermal results would be the most damaging, although you might also be able to use some sort of thermal coil to let the water cool back down before re-entring the system. Chemicals may also be involved, however.
Thor Christensen:
October 31, 2012 at 6:58 pm
As I understand it, the real danger is the methane that is trapped under layers of the sea floor. Once you start messing with it and releasing methane into the air in large quantities you have a real problem in your hands.
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 7:08 pm
Thor: Actually, properly controlled, that methane could be an abundant source of energy for your operation.
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 7:09 pm
Thor Christensen You could even get the energy twice - the movement of the methane the first time, and then capture of and combustion of it the second time. A DOUBLE energy source.
Thor Christensen:
October 31, 2012 at 7:14 pm
I'm suspicious - I don't see how it can be controlled safely and the consequences of release are potentially cataclysmic. However, I am neither an engineer nor a scientist...
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 7:17 pm
It's quite simple: make it so easy to go through the pipe that none of the methane wants to go any other way. I agree it could be dangerous, but people do dangerous jobs - they usually make good money that way. And it's not in our interest for them to die as it would blow up all the equipment too so I think they probably won't, but again, only probably. ;)
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 7:18 pm
Errr, not none, very little. Wish there was an edit button.
Nick Conner:
October 31, 2012 at 7:21 pm
Haha - love the crazy brainstorming here. Agree that this could be some double dip energy source if done right. On a lighter note, this whole concept starts to sound more and more like a crazy Bond villain scheme or the next disaster movie plot in the making.
Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 9:13 pm
The workers would be paid very well. LOL!
Alex Roumanidakis:
November 1, 2012 at 12:32 am
Life can't really process any elements larger than iron, the atoms get stuck in the body and ultimately damage organ systems which filter fluids. So no, I'd say there is no biological worry. The only issue I could see is lowering the thermal conductivity of the ocean slightly, which would actually be beneficial since oceans worldwide are rising in temperature.
Jeremy Janson:
November 1, 2012 at 11:45 pm
@Alex: You are assuming two things here:

1) This process will not heat up the sea water. 2) This process will not involve dangerous chemicals as intermediaries.

2 could possibly be correct, but there is no way at all that 1 could be correct.
Alex Roumanidakis:
November 1, 2012 at 11:57 pm
@Jeremy

Good catch, although we're both assuming we have some method for collecting such a low concentration of solute. You'd need Maxwell's Demon to accomplish this.
Jeremy Janson:
November 2, 2012 at 4:18 am
@Alex: ROTFLMAO! Very true. I guess with the wonder of the nanotech era and fullerenes we've all gotten a little more gullible.
Elpis Expectation:
December 20, 2012 at 3:05 am
Thor Christensen Hey! One good source of information is the Journal of Petroleum Geology, vol 21, issue 3, pages 343-358, July 1998. You're welcome.

Adam Jones:

October 31, 2012 at 5:13 pm

You did not take into account the fact that the filtered water will remix continuously as the plant works causing it to be less efficient as time goes on. To get all the precious metals out of the ocean you would have to cycle through the ocean multiple times.

Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 7:15 pm
If you locate at a place like, say, the top of the Kamchatka peninsula or Chukchi, you may be able to filter the water more quickly than the filtered water circulates back to the facility by pumping it from one side to the other, but you would have to have a very fast rate of filtration, at least equal to the speed of recirculation.

Anthony Burge:

October 31, 2012 at 4:29 pm

I wonder what resources we'll find in the watery depths of Europa.

Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 5:59 pm
Costs more to extract from a planet or moon however because it has a significant gravitational pull.
Marc Favreau:
November 1, 2012 at 10:11 pm
Anything with (somewhat) less gravity than earth we already have materials robust enough to build space elevators though... Now if we could only get there! ^^
Jeremy Janson:
November 1, 2012 at 11:46 pm
@Marc: Yeah but with an asteroid you don't need to build a space elevator. Firing a gun sends you to escape velocity!

James Daniel Wilcox:

October 31, 2012 at 4:37 pm

Very very cool! So glad I am aiming for Astro Mining with my college career.

Blake Hagan:

October 31, 2012 at 4:31 pm

I love it. When can I give you guys all of my money?

Thor Christensen:

October 31, 2012 at 6:54 pm

While I agree with the conclusion, there are a lot of other metals to be extracted from the sea. Add those to platinum and the equation changes. Cost of transport to/from space for mining equipment (extraction, purification, smelting) is changing but remains the key. The factories that use those materials are here on earth and unfortunately not in space where they should be. What is PR doing in that regard (material processing in space, the moon, etc.)?

Andre' Smith:
October 31, 2012 at 10:17 pm
Thor... I addressed that to PR about 3 weeks ago in a long-winded email of probabilities... just thinking out loud that's all. In my neck of the woods in Alabama I always see coal trains so my thought is "how do we get 1,000's of thousands of tons of space material back to earth to begin with?...rocket trains?"... our best bet is "moon metal processing station". My boss Harry Stamper/Armageddon said NASA put a man on the moon cuz they always thinking shit up"... I'm sure this was the first option considered...be a softer landing and Papa Bear like soft landings.
Louis Stephen Carrozzi:
November 2, 2012 at 12:21 am
Yeah, I am thinking of something like a space conveyor belt. Not a physical belt, mind you, but a chain of small vehicles harnessing and grabbing rocks and sending them back here to orbit, then having a second system of "controlled crashing" them back to earth. Since there would be no people aboard the "grabbers", you can forgo life support systems, and deadlines for missions. Slow, but steady supply.The key would be how to keep the flow secure, and the critical areas would be how to keep giant rocks from flying out of control and hitting cities here (that would be bad) and getting them from orbit onto the ground consistently into he same landing zone. it would be helpful if the vehicles themselves were reusable, or very cheap.
Louis Stephen Carrozzi:
November 2, 2012 at 12:53 am
OK, my bad. I should have read more about P.R.s overall plan before I posted. I see where they are going - local processing in space. It could work, but the technological challenges are going to be massive. Space is an unforgiving environment, and very high tech equipment operating in a potentially punishing environment like an asteroid field are prone to things going wrong... I still think doing processing out there is risky. Every profitable mining or refining operation that I can think of on Earth involves simple technologies processing massive amounts of natural materials quickly. Even with simple tech like we have on Earth, take aluminum smelting as an example, requires machines working at extreme temperatures with massive amounts of power, and usually have a full time staff on hand to monitor and maintain the equipment. When you have a 30 minute lead time on communications, all of the gear would need to be self regulating, have significant AI on board, and have fail-safes for thousands of potential problems. The more complicated the vehicle, the more things can go wrong exponentially. The most recent Mars rover has a lot of tech on board, but it cost $2 billion dollars for the mission, and it's not doing anything nearly as intensive as processing tons of material and flying it around the solar system. This will require either a quantum leap of processing and robotics technology, or a lower-tech disposable approach. At least as far as I can see, but I could be very wrong. Maybe that's why we used "Replicants" in Blade Runner. =)
Fred Fisher:
November 2, 2012 at 2:21 pm
Actually space is a wonderful place for a smelter. Zero gravity allows amalgams that would layer out on earth, and space is the perfect heat sink. FF
Jeremy Janson:
November 2, 2012 at 3:26 pm
@Fred: The only issue would be not wanting the thing to drift around too much.
Nick Conner:
November 2, 2012 at 9:54 pm
@Louis - I like the thought of using the limited friction of space to basically shoot rocks with valuable payloads at earth to process. I'd have some concerns though (know this isn't what PR plans to do, but interesting to think about). Outside the public relations nightmare, there would need to be a study done to see what the impact of shooting these rocks to earth would be. Celestial bodies hitting the earth kick up dust (how much...global warming?), burn up to some degree in the atmosphere (what happens to the payload?). But the most interesting thought to me is how processing in space will impact our expansion. Any minerals (or water) found and processed in space would result in materials floating in space beyond our gravity well. It could have a huge impact on design and construction of future space vehicles outside the scope of what we can create today...since everything we build has to be transported out of the gravity well using our current cost prohibitive technologies.
Jeremy Janson:
November 2, 2012 at 10:26 pm
@Andre: Actually sending it to the moon would be a horrible idea because you would then need a massive amount of rocket fuel to break the moons gravitational pull. It takes a very minimal amount of fuel to navigate outer space when you're outside of significant gravitational pulls, so the best idea is probably just build a heat resistant capsule with hard outer shell and a small "pusher" rocket that would be almost comically small to guide it in the direction you want. Once it reaches earth, just be sure to crash it in to a crash strip somewhere out in the desert and then use bulldozers and the like to retrieve it. If you do have any kind of preprocessing, it should be at Zero G so it doesn't take much fuel to leave the facility.
Jeremy Janson:
November 2, 2012 at 10:27 pm
Louis Stephen Carrozzi : Yeah it could be risky, although it probably isn't neccesary in order for the operation to work. A crash strip somewhere in the desert, then retrieve, load on trains, and send to facilities on earth could work.
Jeremy Janson:
November 2, 2012 at 10:30 pm
Nick Conner : "Any minerals (or water) found and processed in space would result in materials floating in space beyond our gravity well." Well and that may actually be the best reason to process in space - it opens up a new market for the goods. Water processed in space is worth exponentially more (enough to be significant, in fact) than additional water on Earth. Economics is the science of scarcity, after all.

Isaac Mooers:

October 31, 2012 at 4:21 pm

More about this please "In a followup, we’ll talk about how the water on carbonaceous asteroids paves the way for a robust space economy!"

John SherpaPsy Grasett:
October 31, 2012 at 4:36 pm
Water is the key to life, both here on Earth, and anywhere else we intend to inhabit.
Rei McCauley:
November 2, 2012 at 2:59 pm
Not to mention the usual hydrogen we can strip off. That stuff can be hard to come by out in space.

Joshua Majchrzak:

January 23, 2013 at 8:24 pm

we are going to need a orbital refinery, space tugs and a way to mine the mass. To streemline the process, fuel assemblers and a lot more to get this all started but the scaner probes are a first step it is a good thing they are geting ready to be launched. I played a lot of space RTS 's when I was younger, so I have a okay picture of what is needed to start mining, and setup a mining economy. But it would be real nice if we could reconfigure atoms to become other atoms, I know it is possible, and that is why I am going for a nano tech degree.

Ian Line:

October 31, 2012 at 10:05 pm

That is amazing! Makes me wonder how greatly important these elements might be for life in the sea and elsewhere on Earth. Do plankton and algae utilize the various elements for their survival? Furthermore, makes one wonder about meteor showers such as the Perseids. This meteor shower is created by the Swift-Tuttle comet. Scoop up a load of mysterious space elements from that 3d ring of a trail.

Adam Williamson:

October 31, 2012 at 5:50 pm

the other problem is that pulling mineral from the water would actually hurt any life in the ocean as they have become accustom to having said mineral in the water there eco systems adapt. removing it may seem harmless but in fact may have huge repercussions.

Donald Franck:

October 31, 2012 at 9:07 pm

Peter, is there any word on property rights? If you do bring home a sample from an asteroid, would it be sold on EBAY or would the government demand it? Would the rest of the asteroid be the company's to claim as an asset?

Kirat Gurung:

October 31, 2012 at 5:53 pm

1,300,000,000,000,000,000,000 liters? How do you know that?

Jeremy Janson:
October 31, 2012 at 6:04 pm
It would be an estimate, which is also why its only giving you the first two digits of estimation and giving perfect 0's down the line thereafter to signify no accuracy.

Tyler Bates:

October 31, 2012 at 5:07 pm

Definitely keeping my eye on this company, hope to see it prosper.

Eric Brown:

November 4, 2012 at 2:52 am

A small parallel effort could seed potential developments in an environment rich with resources.

How difficult is it for physicists to extract differences in causal relationships relative to entanglement experiments, to document non-relativistic properties of quantum causality? A literature search and a systematic effort of documentation in a common database.

Why? Because if bending space-time locally is feasible, then present elements here on Earth can be converted from one element to another. Mining any ore could potentially produce any other elements, including exotic elements.

Seems like the small funding of a research effort of physicists interested in quantum causality could provide insights into the potential sequence of development that could produce related tools in the near future.

Many many thousands of physicists are under utilized.

Seeding business developments under royalty contracts seems like a method of promoting sustainability of advancing research.

Eric Brown:

November 4, 2012 at 2:31 am

Any mining here on Earth produces more expenses/liabilities/costs for cleanup and environmental recovery than the profits of the effort produces. Earth based mining destruction is simply ignored for the purpose of profit.

Consider the environmental effects of pulling trace minerals out of the ocean and the effects upon the environment.

The mining operations of asteroids, if platinum is present, produces a great number of collateral businesses. All of the other minerals to be mined including the platinum. Tailings can be ejected into gravity wells aimed into the Sun up and over the orbits of planets; fuel for the Sun instead of pollution.

Or the tailings can be used as natural shielding and insulation to develop living environments.

Everything about an operation should evolve seeding diverse business developments; not just developing an unsustainable focused outcome.

Adam Michael:

October 31, 2012 at 8:35 pm

I think for the business case, one must look at how much capital outlays are needed to acquire a given amount (in terms of mass of platinum in this case) of material to generate a revenue. I think you would be hard pressed to build an extraction machine for less than $16 million to break even. Having said that, one could extract other precious material simultaneously like the lunar volatiles extractor (http://www.sbir.gov/sbirsearch/detail/328055) envisioned for the Constellation program and other future programs that collect a range of volatiles for in-situ use. While the mechanics of how both operate are very different, the principle of building a machine to capture multiple materials at once might improve the return on investment.

So, if you have several pieces of equipment that sum to the cost of $10 billion, you must then acquire at least $10 billion to break even. The question then becomes a matter of dollars per mass recovered. Comparing this to space mining, I think it all depends on estimate the cost of equipment and labor required to acquire the material. This is the central problem that should be explored for either venture in order to determine feasibility.

Also, Nick Conner makes a good point from the environmental engineering perspective. The impact in space may be much smaller due to the independence from asteroids on our ecosystem (indirectly these may be related, but not to a large degree in the future with the ability to steer asteroids).

Lori Hill:
October 31, 2012 at 8:46 pm
Funny enough, I just had this same discussion with Victor.
Adam Michael:
October 31, 2012 at 9:03 pm
Additionally, I think it could be looked at from first principles where you break down the cost of moving the water (which is quantifiable by energy and material resource needs), building the machine, and maintaining the machine with the assumption that labor is included in each of these umbrella operations. I will have to take a few more days to really look at the feasibility. I am sure many of you will be looking at this as well. Totally excited to hear how more of you think about this.

And Lori, I bet Victor had some really good input. ;)
Lori Hill:
October 31, 2012 at 9:21 pm
You betchya Adam.

John Michael Lapides:

October 31, 2012 at 6:09 pm

As I've seen others point out, straining the ocean for sea water seems like a heavy strain on the environment. Instead of taking from the oceans, we should be trying to halt the influx of industrial waste into the oceans... but that is beside the point. The true genius of Planetary Resources is the opportunity to bring more resources to the earth, so that we don't have to risk destroying the planet that sustains us.

David Meller:

October 31, 2012 at 5:27 pm

This is a Feynman-esque calculation and completely effective in making the argument against going after seawater. I once heard him do a extemporaneous, guesstimate calculation of the number of piano tuners in the greater Chicago area, and he got very close.

Shelby McIntyre:

October 31, 2012 at 6:46 pm

But what if you could extract all of the substances and elements from each liter of. seawater (not just one such as Platinum). What would the economics of that be? What is the current value of all the elements in a liter of sea-water, even the salt?

Saeed Chehrazi:

October 31, 2012 at 5:25 pm

The calculation is nice and the scale of resources in space is infinite, however, what are the chances of finding some large amount of platinum in earth crust under the ocean? It should be detected first though :)

Jurek Mielczarek:

November 12, 2012 at 6:43 pm

on asteroids is it possible to find metallic hydrogen?

Louis Stephen Carrozzi:

November 2, 2012 at 12:07 am

Yes, this is all about the numbers. The ROI for getting platinum out of seawater is probably not very good. To build a plant big enough to process water at the rate of Niagra falls isn't likely a 16 million dollar plant. According to some very quick searching a facility the size of the Hoover Dam, which would probably be similar in size to something that could process Niagra Falls, you are looking at $690 million dollars in 2008 dollars (+ cost overruns which would likely be millions more). At that rate, and at a rate of $16 million dollars every 7 years it would take roughly 300 years just to pay back the initial costs of the facility. The entire game of Planetary Resources will be how to process the maximum volume of material for the lowest possible cost. Since it costs a tremendous amount of money to put every pound of equipment into space ( somewhere between $200-$10,000 per pound at the moment) then either the equipment sent up will have to be incredibly efficient in processing material and getting the refined material back to Earth safely, or the price of getting things into space will need to be dramatically reduced. Or, if a system of cheap, light, "disposable", machines can get the HUGE amount of material back to us safely, we could process it here and save the entire cost of trying to processing it in space. If we can get a rover to hit a bullseye on mars with some jets and a parachute... it will be interesting to see where P.R. goes!

Donald Franck:
November 2, 2012 at 1:13 am
actually the goal is to beable to establish property rights for a rock once they bring back samples. You do not have to bring everything back to have value. The value of a mine is determined by how much is still in the ground, not how much you have taken out. If they own the rock and all the estimated reserves, they can do what they did in california when faced with limited transportation. Just hang a sign up ... BANK .. electronic banking and the only thing that changes is who owns how much.
Louis Stephen Carrozzi:
November 4, 2012 at 2:37 am
I have a few Super-Novas for sale if you want them... =)

Chuck Simmons:

November 1, 2012 at 11:41 pm

In addition to mining multiple metals, you might also consider: what if the mining was using waste from some other process, like, say, a desalination plant. Give or take, something like 6,000 large desalination plants would add up to a Niagra Falls.

Alternatively, instead of bringing the water to the filter, take the filter to the water. Consider something like a bacterium, plankton, algae, or even kelp that grows in sea water and concentrate precious metals. Mollusks concentrate copper to parts per thousand. A genetically engineered organism may be able to do something similar with platinum-group metals.

Easier still is small robots going out and picking up maganese nodules off the sea floor.

Of course, we don't go around harvesting squid to mine copper. But just because you found one way that doesn't work to do something, doesn't mean you've proven something can't be done.

Aditya Muralidhar:

October 31, 2012 at 6:31 pm

Our oceans' hydrogen alone could sustain a stable space fountain system for interplanetary transport network development and I'd leave precious metals to deep mantle exploration.

Definitely raises good questions about uranium processing and plasmafication for syngas production from oceanic platforms.

Further USGS calculation charts and other elemental analysis in oceanography @. http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4558