My[confined]Space

wookie_x (UID# 962) 0  0
July 4, 2008 at 1:41 am

We will continue! The age of commercial extra-atmosphere transport is just starting. I’m firmly convinced that the next 10 years will see an explosion (no pun intended) of activity in space and toward the moon. I envision the energy companies scrambling to get behind various programs including mining the moon for fusionable materials, orbital nuclear reactors, and solar power. In the next 100 years materials manufacturing is going to have to start taking place in space as we start ending terrestrial mining and recycle building materials for new buildings. This means mining the asteroid belt, since there are billions of tons of raw materials. A single asteroid with a mean diameter of 1 kilometer could contain 2 billions tons of nickel-iron ore. That’s more than twice the amount of iron mined globally in 2004. The possibilities are astronomical (pun intended). As you can likely tell, I’m a big proponent. Wheee! Space!