But the plummeting price of gold from the abundance would make the asteroid mining commercially nonviable. As an aside, only 7.16% of the gold demand in the world is actually for technology: https://www.statista.com/statistics/299609/gold-demand-by-industry-sector-share/
this post was submitted on 01 Jun 2025
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There are many many more materials than just gold that could be extracted from asteroids.
But sure, establishing the infrastructure to make it commercially viable is a huge investment and won't be commercially viable for a while. (Think about missions like Hayabusa that cost hundreds of millions to bilLions, but retrieved "just" a couple of gram of material.)
I suspect asteroid mining won't be profitable unless we are able to use the materials to build stuff in space. It costs so much to launch stuff into space that a ton of say iron is going to be worth much more there than on earth. Whether we'll ever reach that stage is anyone's guess but I hope so.
Just need to make sure the mining machine is durable enough and can launch itself from asteroids, because launching from asteroids with their low gravity is a lot easier than from earth, so a single earth launch can mine from multiple asteroids and send stuffs back.
If the price of gold plunges one day, it should already plunge today. In other words, the probability for success of those mining operations is low.
Are they able to lab grow the same kind of gem quality diamonds that you usually think about when it comes to jewelry, or is it still mostly industrial applications (such as diamond tipped drill bits)?
I've heard that lab grown are actually better across each measurement (clarity,shine, whatever), than natural diamonds, now.
I'm skeptical about the feasibility of transporting heavy metals through space. Also, diamond were never scarce, it was all literally market manipulation.
Yes, if diamonds were rare I wouldn't have a diamond tipped drillbit set and several diamond saws. "Blah blah" quality ... sure ... but rare is rare.
Eh they are already moving a good clip relative to the earth, nudging them in this direction would be the easier part of the equation. Stopping them when they get here is probably where you want to focus your energy... No pun intended
I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
Asteroid mining would collapse the markets for most minerals, except perhaps the higher volume stuff like iron.
Beltalowda
Excellent. One of Israels biggest exports is finished gemstones. I hope they are crushed.
they don't mine them. just process them. not sure it's lowering the cost of raw diamonds will change the processing cost.
its morning and haven't had my coffee, so I'm on instinct. I feel like it would lower the cost.
The breaktrough for asteroid mining isn't propulsion but how to mine and process ore in a vacuum.
Given how big asteroids can be, that must be a massive microwave! Though the spinning plate probably won't work due to gravity...
Well, i didn't find it, but there was some news a few years ago, about progress to practical use of Maser as tunnel boring/melting device.
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Have we even confirmed there are asteroids made of gold yet?
Surely there exists a better source. Not clicking on Fox News.
Here is an archived snapshot I found of the Fox article
At the bottom it says the story originally ran in The Sun, here is a snapshot of that page as well.
I followed the other user's snarky DDG link and the first hit is this article from Smithsonian Magazine that appears to be about the same story.
Finally, here is a far less sweaty page from NASA about the actual object, though the composition of metals isn't discussed in detail.
After skimming all this I kinda feel like it's a stretch to say that asteroid is "made of gold".
I think "enough gold to completely destroy the gold industry (as a precious metal)" is close enough to "made of gold" for me.
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Can’t wait for the day when we can have proper corrosion resistant materials. Just gold plate the hull of a ship, and salt water can’t do much.
Would that really help though? Gold is super soft so I think it would need to get frequently coated/plated again
and we already have pretty good and resistant marine paint.
Titanium is very corrosion resistant, not to mention plastics/fiberglass/carbon fiber, as I understand.
But yeah, cheap gold would be be great, just seems to me that the market would more be in e.g. electronics, where both corrosion resistance and electrical conductivity are required (something gold is fairly unique at).
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