SpaceX Dragon spacecraft for low cost trips to the Moon.

[RGClark]

The Orion spacecraft and Altair lunar lander intended for a manned Moon mission are large craft that would require a heavy lift launcher for the trip. However the Dragon capsule is a smaller capsule that would allow lunar missions with currently existing launchers.
The idea for this use would be for it to act as a reusable shuttle only between LEO and the lunar surface. This page gives the dry mass of the Dragon capsule of 3,180 kg:

SpaceX reveals first Dragon engineering unit.
DATE:16/03/07
By Rob Coppinger
http://www.flightglobal.com/article...ex-reveals-first-dragon-engineering-unit.html

The wet mass with propellant would be higher than this but for use only as a shuttle between LEO and the Moon, the engines and propellant would be taken up by the attached propulsion system. With crew and supplies call the capsule mass 4,000 kg.
On this listing of space vehicles you can find that the later versions of the Centaur upper stage have a mass ratio of about 10 to 1:

http://www.friends-partners.org/partners/mwade/alpha/alpndexc.htm

The Isp's given for the RL-10A engines used on these stages are around 450 s, but an updated version with a longer, extensible nozzle has an Isp of 465.5 s:

RL10B-2.
http://www.pw.utc.com/products/pwr/assets/pwr_rl10b-2.pdf

This page gives the delta-V's needed for trips within the Earth-Moon system:

Delta-V budget.
Earth–Moon space.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta-v_budget#Earth.E2.80.93Moon_space

The architecture will be to use a larger Centaur upper stage to serve as the propulsion system to take the vehicle from LEO to low lunar orbit. This larger stage will not descend to the surface, but will remain in orbit. A smaller Centaur stage will serve as the descent stage and will also serve as the liftoff stage that will take the spacecraft not just back to lunar orbit, but all the way to back to LEO. The larger Centaur stage will return to LEO under its own propulsion, to make the system fully reusable. Both stages will use aerobraking to reduce the delta-V required to return to LEO.
For the larger Centaur, take the gross mass of the stage alone as 30,000 kg, and its dry mass as 1/10th of that at 3,000 kg. For the smaller Centaur stage take the gross mass as 10,000 kg and the dry mass as 1,000 kg. The "Delta-V budget" page gives the delta-V from LEO to low lunar orbit as 4,040 m/s. In calculating the delta-V provided by the larger Centaur stage we'll retain 1,000 kg propellant at the end of the burn for the return trip of this stage to LEO: 465.5*9.8ln((30,000 + 10,000 + 4,000)/(3,000 +10,000 + 4,000 + 1,000)) = 4,077 m/s, sufficient to reach low lunar orbit. For this stage alone to return to LEO, 1,310 m/s delta-V is required. The 1,000 kg retained propellant provides 465.5*9.8ln((3,000 + 1,000)/3,000) = 1,312 m/s, sufficient for the return.
The delta-V to go from low lunar orbit to the Moon's surface is 1,870 m/s. And to go from the Moon's surface back to LEO is 2,740 m/s, for a total of 4,610 m/s. The delta-V provided by this smaller Centaur stage is 465.5*9.8ln((10,000 + 4,000)/(1,000 + 4,000)) = 4,697 m/s, sufficient for lunar landing and the return to LEO.
The RL-10 engine was proven to be reusable for multiple uses with quick turnaround time on the DC-X. The total propellant load of 40,000 kg could be lofted by two 20,000+ kg payload capacity launchers, such as the Atlas V, Delta IV Heavy, Ariane 5, and Proton.
The price for these launchers is in the range of $100-140 million according to the specifications on this page:

Expendable Launch Vehicles.
http://www.spaceandtech.com/spacedata/elvs/elvs.shtml

So two would be in the range of $200-$280 million. The Dragon spacecraft and Centaur stages being reusable for 10+ uses would mean their cost per flight should be significantly less than this. This would bring the cost into the range affordable to be purchased by most national governments.
Still, it would be nice to reduce that $200 million cost just to bring the propellant to orbit. One possibility might be the heavy lift launchers being planned by NASA. One of the main problems in deciding on a design for the launchers is that there would be so few launches the per launch cost would be too high. However, launching of the propellant to orbit for lunar missions would provide a market that could allow multiple launches per year thus reducing the per launch cost of the heavy lift launchers. For instance, the Direct HLV team claims their launcher would cost $240 million per launch if they could make 12 launches per year:

JULY 23, 2009
Interview with Ross Tierney of Direct Launch by Sander Olson.
http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/07/interview-with-ross-tierney-of-direct.html

This launcher would have a 70,000 kg payload capacity. However, if you removed the payload fairing and interstage and just kept the propellant to be launched to orbit in the ET itself and considering the fact that the shuttle system was able to launch 100,000+ kg to orbit with the shuttle and payload, it's possible the propellant that could be launched to orbit could be in the range of 100,000 kg. Then the cost per kg to orbit would be $2,400 per kg, or about a $100 million cost for the propellant to orbit.
Reduction of the per launch cost for the heavy lift launchers would then allow affordable launches of the larger spacecraft and landers for lunar missions.


Bob Clark

 

[Urwumpe]

Reignitable != reusable. The RL-10 engines can be restarted ten times, the stage itself has a very limited lifetime.

Unless you make the stage chemically inert (as for LCROSS), it has the annoying tendency to explode in orbit after a few weeks. Also the Centaur stage is so effective because it has just enough dry mass as needed for wrapping the fuel (by balloon tank structure), you can't land it in one piece.

 

[PhantomCruiser]

I saw an interview w/ Elon Musk regarding the use of the Dragon. At the time he stated that the Dragon is really only built for LEO operations, and doesn't see it being used in any other capacity. Perhaps the Dragon can be modified for use otherwise though.
It being Elon, he probably has plans in mind for another vehicle for lunar or Martian operations.
If/when I can find the video I'll post a link to it.

 

[RGClark]

I saw an interview w/ Elon Musk regarding the use of the Dragon. At the time he stated that the Dragon is really only built for LEO operations, and doesn't see it being used in any other capacity. Perhaps the Dragon can be modified for use otherwise though.
It being Elon, he probably has plans in mind for another vehicle for lunar or Martian operations.
If/when I can find the video I'll post a link to it.

SpaceX intended to use the Dragon capsule for manned circumlunar flights and to, likely, use an unmanned version for cargo transport to the Moon:

Musk: $80 million to go to the Moon.
By Rob Coppinger
on July 7, 2008 10:38 AM
http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/hyperbola/2008/07/musk-80-million-to-go-to-the-m.html

DATE:02/10/08
SOURCE:Flight International
SpaceX offers NASA $80 million lunar cargo lander service
By Rob Coppinger
http://www.flightglobal.com/article...sa-80-million-lunar-cargo-lander-service.html

For the manned circumlunar version, from Elon's description it clearly would use the Dragon capsule. For the unmanned lunar cargo version he did not say specifically the Dragon would be used but it seems likely since the Dragon has a cargo version so rather than developing a whole new capsule and considering the low cost they claimed to offer this lunar cargo lander that they would use the Dragon for this purpose as well.


Bob Clark

 

[RGClark]

Apollo took 3 days to go from Earth orbit to lunar orbit. For my plan I want to use a small capsule for the crew for the entire trip so ideally the one-way trip time should be shorter than that.
At 11 km/s escape velocity a straight to the Moon flight would take less than 10 hours. Are there trajectories from Earth orbit to lunar orbit that would take comparable amounts of delta-V as that now used but result in travel times of less than a day?

Bob Clark

 

[francisdrake]

From what I read in the interview it referred a 1 ton unmanned lander for 80 millions. While this is still ambitious, it seems far more realistic than a manned lunar mission for that price.

For a proposed manned circumlunar mission: I don't think it would be a good idea to cramp 7 persons into a capsule as small as the Dragon for a one week flight. Could be somewhat claustrophobic, let alone thinking of having to change your diapers during the flight :uhh:

 

[Wishbone]

The sanitation available (MAGs - aka space diapers and WC) are somewhat ahead of Apollo-era bags. Just how much of that fits into the Dragon is (to me) unknown. Inquiring minds want to know. Also, how many towels are allowed per person?

 

[RGClark]

An even lower cost possibility for the capsule and lander might be one proposed by the University of Maryland aerospace engineering department:

Phoenix: A Low-Cost Commercial Approach to the Crew Exploration Vehicle.
http://www.nianet.org/rascal/forum2006/presentations/1010_umd_paper.pdf

As with the Orion CEV, this Phoenix spacecraft was intended to be used in conjunction with a separate lander for lunar missions. However, by using it both for the trip from LEO and as the lander you get great savings in cost.
On page 3 of the report is given a breakdown of the weights of the various subsystems. By removing the propulsion system as I suggested for the Dragon for this purpose, the mass with crew would be about half that of the Dragon, at about 2,000 kg.
Then assuming again 10 to 1 mass ratios for two Centaur style stages for propulsion, we would need about half the propellant load as for the Dragon, about 20,000 kg, which could be lofted by a single launch of the current largest launchers.
Then the cost of lofting this propellant load to LEO would be about $100 million. And if a new heavy lift launcher could get a $2,400 per kg launch price, it would only be in the range of $50 million.
This would increase even further the market for such low cost lunar missions.
Especially innovative about this design is the "parashield" thermal protection. Not only is this lightweight but another advantage is that it has a higher protective area so that you can use a larger volume cylindrical structure rather than the usual conical structure for the capsule. An important consideration for a capsule intended to carry civilians and tourists.

From the report "Phoenix: A Low-Cost Commercial Approach to the Crew Exploration":

"Figure 5.9-1: Phoenix ParaShield in stowed and deployed configurations."

Bob Clark

 

[RGClark]

SpaceX has said two Falcon Heavy launches would be required to carry a manned Dragon to a lunar landing. However, the 53 metric ton payload capacity of a single Falcon Heavy would be sufficient to carry the 30 mT (Earth departure stage + lunar lander system) described below. This would require 20 mT and 10 mT gross mass Centaur-style upper stages. This page gives the cost of a ca. 20 mT Centaur upper stage as $30 million:

Centaur IIA.
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/cenuriia.htm

A 10 mT Centaur-style stage would be somewhat less than this, so the total for both less than $60 million.

The 53 mT to LEO capacity of the Falcon Heavy would also allow large lunar cargo transport using two of the 20 mT gross mass Centaurs that already exist either using the Dragon to carry the cargo or by carrying somewhat more cargo just within a lightweight container.

An important cargo delivery to the Moon would be in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) equipment, specifically for producing propellant from the water discovered to lie within the shadowed craters near the lunar poles. Elon Musk has said a key goal of his is to mount a manned Mars mission within 1 to 2 decades. Such a mission could be mounted more cheaply if the large amount of propellant required did not have to be lofted from the Earth's deep gravity well but could be taken from the Moon.

Another important cargo delivery would be to carry a rover that could do a sample return mission from the near polar locations. Lunar orbiter observations suggest there may be valuable minerals concentrated in such locations:

SCIENCE -- October 21, 2010 at 2:05 PM EDT
Moon Blast Reveals Lunar Surface Rich With Compounds.
BY: JENNY MARDER
"There is water on the moon ... along with a long list of other compounds,
including, mercury, gold and silver. That's according to a more detailed
analysis of the chilled lunar soil near the moon's South Pole, released as six papers by a large team of scientists in the journal, Science Thursday."
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2010/10/its-confirmed-there-is-water.html

If these tentative detections could be confirmed then that could possibly form a commercial market for flights to the Moon.

In this vein note there is even stronger evidence for large amounts of valuable minerals on asteroids. Observations suggest that even a small size asteroid could contain trillions of dollars (that's trillions with a 't') worth of valuable minerals:

Riches in the Sky: The Promise of Asteroid Mining.
Mark Whittington, Nov 15, 2005
http://voices.yahoo.com/riches-sky-promise-asteroid-mining-8776.html

It is quite important to note then that since the delta-V requirements to some near Earth asteroids is less than that to the Moon, that the sample return version of the lunar lander could also be used to return samples from the near Earth asteroids. If these asteroidal detections could be definitively confirmed by a sample return mission then that would provide further justification for private investment in lunar propellant production installations.

SpaceX expects to launch the first Falcon Heavy in 2013. Because the required Centaur stages already exist it is possible that a lunar lander could be formed from such mated together stages within this time frame at least for a unmanned cargo version.

It is important though that such a lander be privately financed. Because the required stages already exist I estimate a lander could be formed from them for less than a $100 million development cost. This is based on the fact that SpaceX was able to develop the Falcon 9 launcher for about $300 million development cost. And this required development of both the engines and the stages for a 300 mT gross mass and 30 mT dry mass launcher. But for this lunar lander, the engines and stages already exist for a total 40 mT gross mass and 4 mT dry mass system.

If the system were to be government financed then based on the fact that SpaceX was able to develop the Falcon 9 for 1/10th the development cost of usual NASA financed systems, the cost of the lander would suddenly balloon to a billion dollar development.

Note that while the evidence for valuable minerals in the lunar shadowed craters is not yet particularly strong, the evidence for such minerals in the asteroids is. So there is a strong financial incentive for forming such a lunar lander as it could also be used for the asteroidal lander.
But asteroidal mineral retrieval flights could be launched much more cheaply if the propellant could be obtained from the Moon. Then there is a strong financial incentive to produce ISRU installations on the Moon which would require lunar return missions from the shadowed crater regions to assess the best means of harvesting this lunar water for propellant. If such return missions also confirm the presence of valuable minerals in the shadowed craters then that would be like icing on the cake for justification of private investment in such missions.



Bob Clark

The Orion spacecraft and Altair lunar lander intended for a manned Moon mission are large craft that would require a heavy lift launcher for the trip. However the Dragon capsule is a smaller capsule that would allow lunar missions with currently existing launchers.
The idea for this use would be for it to act as a reusable shuttle only between LEO and the lunar surface. This page gives the dry mass of the Dragon capsule of 3,180 kg:

SpaceX reveals first Dragon engineering unit.
DATE:16/03/07
By Rob Coppinger
http://www.flightglobal.com/article...ex-reveals-first-dragon-engineering-unit.html

The wet mass with propellant would be higher than this but for use only as a shuttle between LEO and the Moon, the engines and propellant would be taken up by the attached propulsion system. With crew and supplies call the capsule mass 4,000 kg.
On this listing of space vehicles you can find that the later versions of the Centaur upper stage have a mass ratio of about 10 to 1:

http://www.friends-partners.org/partners/mwade/alpha/alpndexc.htm

The Isp's given for the RL-10A engines used on these stages are around 450 s, but an updated version with a longer, extensible nozzle has an Isp of 465.5 s:

RL10B-2.
http://www.pw.utc.com/products/pwr/assets/pwr_rl10b-2.pdf

This page gives the delta-V's needed for trips within the Earth-Moon system:

Delta-V budget.
Earth–Moon space.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta-v_budget#Earth.E2.80.93Moon_space

The architecture will be to use a larger Centaur upper stage to serve as the propulsion system to take the vehicle from LEO to low lunar orbit. This larger stage will not descend to the surface, but will remain in orbit. A smaller Centaur stage will serve as the descent stage and will also serve as the liftoff stage that will take the spacecraft not just back to lunar orbit, but all the way to back to LEO. The larger Centaur stage will return to LEO under its own propulsion, to make the system fully reusable. Both stages will use aerobraking to reduce the delta-V required to return to LEO.
For the larger Centaur, take the gross mass of the stage alone as 30,000 kg, and its dry mass as 1/10th of that at 3,000 kg. For the smaller Centaur stage take the gross mass as 10,000 kg and the dry mass as 1,000 kg. The "Delta-V budget" page gives the delta-V from LEO to low lunar orbit as 4,040 m/s. In calculating the delta-V provided by the larger Centaur stage we'll retain 1,000 kg propellant at the end of the burn for the return trip of this stage to LEO: 465.5*9.8ln((30,000 + 10,000 + 4,000)/(3,000 +10,000 + 4,000 + 1,000)) = 4,077 m/s, sufficient to reach low lunar orbit. For this stage alone to return to LEO, 1,310 m/s delta-V is required. The 1,000 kg retained propellant provides 465.5*9.8ln((3,000 + 1,000)/3,000) = 1,312 m/s, sufficient for the return.
The delta-V to go from low lunar orbit to the Moon's surface is 1,870 m/s. And to go from the Moon's surface back to LEO is 2,740 m/s, for a total of 4,610 m/s. The delta-V provided by this smaller Centaur stage is 465.5*9.8ln((10,000 + 4,000)/(1,000 + 4,000)) = 4,697 m/s, sufficient for lunar landing and the return to LEO.
The RL-10 engine was proven to be reusable for multiple uses with quick turnaround time on the DC-X. The total propellant load of 40,000 kg could be lofted by two 20,000+ kg payload capacity launchers, such as the Atlas V, Delta IV Heavy, Ariane 5, and Proton.
The price for these launchers is in the range of $100-140 million according to the specifications on this page:

Expendable Launch Vehicles.
http://www.spaceandtech.com/spacedata/elvs/elvs.shtml

So two would be in the range of $200-$280 million. The Dragon spacecraft and Centaur stages being reusable for 10+ uses would mean their cost per flight should be significantly less than this. This would bring the cost into the range affordable to be purchased by most national governments.
Still, it would be nice to reduce that $200 million cost just to bring the propellant to orbit. One possibility might be the heavy lift launchers being planned by NASA. One of the main problems in deciding on a design for the launchers is that there would be so few launches the per launch cost would be too high. However, launching of the propellant to orbit for lunar missions would provide a market that could allow multiple launches per year thus reducing the per launch cost of the heavy lift launchers. For instance, the Direct HLV team claims their launcher would cost $240 million per launch if they could make 12 launches per year:

JULY 23, 2009
Interview with Ross Tierney of Direct Launch by Sander Olson.
http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/07/interview-with-ross-tierney-of-direct.html

This launcher would have a 70,000 kg payload capacity. However, if you removed the payload fairing and interstage and just kept the propellant to be launched to orbit in the ET itself and considering the fact that the shuttle system was able to launch 100,000+ kg to orbit with the shuttle and payload, it's possible the propellant that could be launched to orbit could be in the range of 100,000 kg. Then the cost per kg to orbit would be $2,400 per kg, or about a $100 million cost for the propellant to orbit.
Reduction of the per launch cost for the heavy lift launchers would then allow affordable launches of the larger spacecraft and landers for lunar missions.


Bob Clark

---------- Post added 02-01-12 at 03:17 AM ---------- Previous post was 01-31-12 at 10:14 AM ----------

Edit:

SpaceX has said two Falcon Heavy launches would be required to carry a manned Dragon to a lunar landing. However, the 53 metric ton payload capacity of a single Falcon Heavy would be sufficient to carry the 30 mT (Earth departure stage + lunar lander system) described below. This would require 20 mT and 10 mT gross mass Centaur-style upper stages.

That should say 40 mT gross mass for the (Earth departure stage + lunar lander) system that was described in the original post in this thread with 30 mT and 10 mT Centaur-style stages.


Bob Clark

 

[T.Neo]

The 53 mT to LEO capacity of the Falcon Heavy would also allow large lunar cargo transport using two of the 20 mT gross mass Centaurs that already exist either using the Dragon to carry the cargo or by carrying somewhat more cargo just within a lightweight container.

- What is the cargo capacity to TLI using this method vs simply using the second stage?

- How do you attach the Centaur stages to the vehicle? They are not designed for this.

- How do you get SpaceX to cooperate with Lockheed/ULA, their staunch enemies?

An important cargo delivery to the Moon would be in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) equipment, specifically for producing propellant from the water discovered to lie within the shadowed craters near the lunar poles.

Where is this ISRU equipment? What is this ISRU equipment? How much does it mass? How much does it cost? What kind of production rates can it achieve?

Such a mission could be mounted more cheaply if the large amount of propellant required did not have to be lofted from the Earth's deep gravity well but could be taken from the Moon.

Very shaky to automatically assume that lunar propellant will be cheaper...

If these tentative detections could be confirmed then that could possibly form a commercial market for flights to the Moon.

Only if the resources could be delivered for less than their value.

In this vein note there is even stronger evidence for large amounts of valuable minerals on asteroids. Observations suggest that even a small size asteroid could contain trillions of dollars (that's trillions with a 't') worth of valuable minerals:

South America probably contains trillions of dollars worth of valuable minerals, that doesn't mean anyone is going to become a trillionaire by discovering that continent.

It is quite important to note then that since the delta-V requirements to some near Earth asteroids is less than that to the Moon, that the sample return version of the lunar lander could also be used to return samples from the near Earth asteroids.

If the asteroids are a better target, why are you even discussing scouting for minerals on the Moon in the first place?

I estimate a lander could be formed from them for less than a $100 million development cost.

HOW did you estimate this?

the evidence for such minerals in the asteroids is.

Where are the scientific publications that say this?

Not just a Popular Mechanics article that says "there could be a trillion dollars worth of stuff locked up inside this kilometer wide rock", real, proper scientific publications detailing the chemical analysis of meteorite fragments, spectral analysis of asteroids?

The more understood the potential is, the more potential there is.

That should say 40 mT gross mass for the (Earth departure stage + lunar lander) system that was described in the original post in this thread with 30 mT and 10 mT Centaur-style stages.

There's an "edit button" on the bottem left side of your post- you can make corrections or additions using that. :tiphat:

 

[RGClark]

...
It is important though that such a lander be privately financed. Because the required stages already exist I estimate a lander could be formed from them for less than a $100 million development cost. This is based on the fact that SpaceX was able to develop the Falcon 9 launcher for about $300 million development cost. And this required development of both the engines and the stages for a 300 mT gross mass and 30 mT dry mass launcher. But for this lunar lander, the engines and stages already exist for a total 40 mT gross mass and 4 mT dry mass system.
If the system were to be government financed then based on the fact that SpaceX was able to develop the Falcon 9 for 1/10th the development cost of usual NASA financed systems, the cost of the lander would suddenly balloon to a billion dollar development.

Nice article here:


SpaceX Might Be Able To Teach NASA A Lesson.
May 23, 2011
By Frank Morring, Jr.
Washington

“I think one would want to understand in some detail . . . why would it be between four and 10 times more expensive for NASA to do this, especially at a time when one of the issues facing NASA is how to develop the heavy-lift launch vehicle within the budget profile that the committee has given it,” Chyba says.
He cites an analysis contained in NASA’s report to Congress on the market for commercial crew and cargo services to LEO that found it would cost NASA between $1.7 billion and $4 billion to do the same Falcon-9 development that cost SpaceX $390 million. In its analysis, which contained no estimates for the future cost of commercial transportation services to the International Space Station (ISS) beyond those already under contract, NASA says it had “verified” those SpaceX cost figures.
For comparison, agency experts used the NASA-Air Force Cost Model—“a parametric cost-estimating tool with a historical database of over 130 NASA and Air Force spaceflight hardware projects”—to generate estimates of what it would cost the civil space agency to match the SpaceX accomplishment. Using the “traditional NASA approach,” the agency analysts found the cost would be $4 billion. That would drop to $1.7 billion with different assumptions representative of “a more commercial development approach,” NASA says.

http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/gene.../awst/2011/05/23/AW_05_23_2011_p36-324881.xml
​

Bob Clark

 

[RGClark]

The original architecture was to use two of the 20 mT to LEO launchers currently available with two Centaur upper stages to get a 4 mT Dragon to the Moon and back. What can we do with a single one of these launchers currently available? Using a single one of these launchers to carry a single Centaur upper stage we could carry about 1 mT to the Moon and back:
From the delta-V table, you need 4.04 km/s to go from LEO to low lunar orbit, 1.87 km/s to go from low lunar orbit to the lunar surface, and 2.74 km/s with aerobraking to go from the lunar surface back to LEO for a total of 8.65 km/s delta-V for a single stage making the round-trip. Then with a 465.5 s Isp, 20 mT total mass including payload, 2 mT dry mass, and 1 mT payload we get: 465.5*9.8ln(20,000/(2000 + 1000)) = 8,650 m/s, sufficient for the round-trip.

This would suffice to carry a lunar rover to operate in the permanently shadowed regions of the lunar poles or for an NEO asteroid:

Lunar Prospecting Robot To Be Field Tested On Hawaii's Mauna Kea.
ScienceDaily (Oct. 14, 2008)
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081014134111.htm

This university developed robot probably cost no more than a few million dollars. The single Centaur upper stage costs in the range of $30 million. And the 20 mT to LEO launchers cost in the range of $100-140 million, according to the Spaceandtech.com site estimates, for a total in the range of $200 million. This is a fraction of the amount spent by mining interests on exploration:

Explore Mining.

World non-ferrous expenditures for all exploration in 2007 are estimated to be about $10.4 Billion dollars.

http://www.holden.house.gov/comm/explore-mining/exploration/

This same site also indicates that mining exploration is by nature high risk:

So just what is exploration? It’s the collection of processes that gather information about the presence or absence of mineral deposits The over-riding goal of exploration is to find deposits that can be worked as profitable mining operations. It is a time-consuming, multi-stage investment in information different gathering processes. It’s also an expensive, high-risk investment, unlike ordinary businesses investments. Depending on the literature source, the success rate for finding profitable mining operations (when weighed against the total number of mineral properties examined by a company) have ranges from a high of 4 in 100 (that’s a 4% success rate!), to less than 1 in 100 and as low as 1 in 1000 (that’s a .1% success rate!).

For any investment venture a cost/risk/benefit analysis has to be made. Compared to the cost already spent by mining interests yearly the cost is relatively low especially for a consortium of mining interests funding the mission together. The risk is composed of the risk of the mission failing and of it not finding the high amounts of precious minerals. At least for the asteroid missions the risk of it not finding the high value minerals is low as there are several independent lines of evidence that precious metals are located uniformly on asteroids. So that leaves the risk of the mission failing. Considering the amount of U.S. experience with planetary missions, this risk is considerably better than the 1 in 1,000 chance of success some estimates put on Earth bound mining exploration.

However, quite important when measuring cost and risk, are the benefits to justify them. The possible benefits are more mineral wealth in a single asteroid than all that mined in all of human history. Indeed the likelihood of the high amounts of precious minerals is so good, and the benefits of success are so extraordinarily high, that it would pay to do several missions if there are failures.

That is for the asteroid missions. However, if such asteroid mining missions are to be profitable then it would be much cheaper if the large amount of propellant needed to carry out the transport could be obtained from the Moon rather than by lofting it from Earth's deep gravity well. Then to insure that propellant could be obtained from the Moon's polar regions sample return missions to the lunar poles would have to be mounted as well. The nice thing about these missions is that the same rovers and spacecraft could be used for the asteroid sample return missions. Then these lunar sample return missions could be regarded as test missions to give further assurance of the technology for returning the samples from asteroids. And if the lunar polar samples show the high precious metal amounts tentatively detected by LCROSS then so much the better.

As I said to keep costs low these missions should be privately financed. NASA is planning to launch an asteroid sample return mission in 2016. This would not return the samples though until 2023 and is budgeted at $800 million without even launch costs:

NASA to Launch Asteroid-Sampling Spacecraft in 2016.
Mike Wall, SPACE.com Senior Writer
Date: 25 May 2011 Time: 07:10 PM ET
http://www.space.com/11788-nasa-asteroid-mission-osiris-rex-1999-rq36.html

When you add on launch costs and considering the usual NASA cost overruns this will probably wind up being a billion dollar mission. Also, since some proposed human missions to asteroids would have a duration of 5 to 6 months, these sample return missions could return their samples in months rather than the seven years planned for the NASA mission.

Bob Clark

 

[T.Neo]

RGClark:

1. Get a blog.

2. Determine the downright economic feasibility of such endeavours before "cost/risk/benefit analyses".

3. #2 goes for lunar propellant achieving cost savings as well.

4. "mineral wealth in a single asteroid than all that mined in all of human history" thing is getting really annoying. You realise just that by injecting such an amount of valuable material into the market you will lower the value of said material.

5. Actually doing the things you describe are a whole universe away from just writing a forum, er, I mean blog post about them... :shifty:

 

[Cras]

or..

1. Chill out

2. a laundry list of question does not a good response make

3. Move on

We all get that you don't like pretty much anything RGClark posts. It is best, in my opinion, that you leave it be rather than tell him to shove off.

 

[T.Neo]

It isn't that I don't like what RGClark posts, just that I think it's incorrect, simplistic or in need of further research, and that it can be improved upon.

 

[Kyle]

Falcon Heavy + Dragon + Cape Canaveral + 4 man crew = Circumlunar missions in this decade.

Short and simple, let Musk fill in the details.

 

[RGClark]

RGClark:
1. Get a blog.
2. Determine the downright economic feasibility of such endeavours before "cost/risk/benefit analyses".
3. #2 goes for lunar propellant achieving cost savings as well.
4. "mineral wealth in a single asteroid than all that mined in all of human history" thing is getting really annoying. You realise just that by injecting such an amount of valuable material into the market you will lower the value of said material.
5. Actually doing the things you describe are a whole universe away from just writing a forum, er, I mean blog post about them... :shifty:

Dr. Paul Spudis has written extensively about the prospects for exploiting the resources of the Moon. See this article with the links to his research work for estimates on the costs of utilizing those resources:

Paul Spudis’ Plan for a Sustainable and Affordable Lunar Base.
by Nancy Atkinson on October 20, 2011
...

And do any new technologies or hardware have to be built?
“Not really,” said Spudis. “Effectively this plan is possible to achieve right now with existing technology. We don’t have any ‘unobtainium’ or any special magical machine that has to be built. It is all very simple outgrowths of existing equipment, and many cases you can use the heritage equipment from previous missions.”
And what about the cost?
Spudis estimates that the entire system could be established for an aggregate cost of less than $88 billion, which would be about $5 billion a year, with peak funding of $6.65 billion starting in Year 11. This total cost includes development of a Shuttle-derived 70 mT launch vehicle, two versions of a Crew Exploration Vehicles (LEO and translunar), a reusable lander, cislunar propellant depots and all robotic surface assets, as well as all of the operational costs of mission support for this architecture.

http://www.universetoday.com/90097/paul-spudis-plan-for-a-sustainable-and-affordable-lunar-base/

A big component of this would be of course the cost of spaceflight. SpaceX believes that this cost can be reduced by two orders of magnitude by reusability, which I happen to agree with.
Considering the delta-V to the near Earth asteroids is less than that to the Moon, the spaceflight costs can be less at least for robotic missions.
I'll ask Spudis about analogous estimates for the costs of asteroid resource utilization.


Bob Clark

 

[T.Neo]

Oh yeah, Paul Spudis... the person who advocates lunar resource utilisation like you advocate SSTO.

Also: it is not "SpaceX believes a two-order-of-magnitude cost reduction is possible", it is more like "Elon Musk believes it, and uses it as marketing talk for his launch vehicle company". There is no assurance whatsoever that SpaceX will ever reach such cost reductions, or even that they will match their currently advertised pricing.

There is also something else to consider: the lower your launch costs become, the worse and worse an alternative lunar propellant becomes. It is pretty bad when you consider that an EELV with a better flight rate could beat Spudis' numbers already.

 

[RGClark]

Oh yeah, Paul Spudis... the person who advocates lunar resource utilisation like you advocate SSTO.
Also: it is not "SpaceX believes a two-order-of-magnitude cost reduction is possible", it is more like "Elon Musk believes it, and uses it as marketing talk for his launch vehicle company". There is no assurance whatsoever that SpaceX will ever reach such cost reductions, or even that they will match their currently advertised pricing.
There is also something else to consider: the lower your launch costs become, the worse and worse an alternative lunar propellant becomes. It is pretty bad when you consider that an EELV with a better flight rate could beat Spudis' numbers already.

Dr. Spudis' credentials on the topic are a heck of a lot better than mine. He could be wrong but you can be assured his conclusions are based on a hard analysis of the data.

I think there is little doubt that Musk seriously believes that launch costs can be reduced to that level; it's not merely a marketing ploy. He has been discussing for years low cost Mars missions which he believes can be made possible with launch costs reduced to such levels. And the SpaceX plans on producing the "Grasshopper" test vehicle is further evidence of the seriousness of their plans on reusability.

If it does happen that reducing the launch costs by, say, two orders of magnitude means it is cheaper to haul fuel from Earth for BEO missions rather than from the Moon, then I would still be quite happy with that. That would still mean such a major reduction in launch costs, that lunar, asteroidal, and Mars missions become much more affordable.


Bob Clark

 

[T.Neo]

RGClark, when people talk about stuff, they are not automatically talking the truth or making sense. It can be destructive to assume that everything is a downright lie, but it is very helpful to realise that not everything is the downright truth.

Constructing a test vehicle does not mean "we will bet our lives on a two order of magnitude cost reduction", it means "we think we could do reusability and we're testing things to find out how". If and when SpaceX reuses one of their vehicles, there is no reason whatsoever to believe that they will immediately reach a two order of magnitude cost reduction (and a whole long list of reasons to believe they won't).

"Elon Musk believes" does not magically makes things possible.

The same goes for Dr Spudis and his "credentials". Credentials don't magically make you correct. Spudis' assumptions, methods, and motivations are just as fallible as those of anyone else. And there is good reason to be skeptical of them when you read some of the other advocacy coming from him (such as how it is important for the US to capture the Moon as a "military high ground", of all things).