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Energy Firm Wants To Be First To Mine the Moon
coondoggie writes "By 2020, the Shackleton Energy Company says it intends to be operating the world's first lunar base and propellant depot for all manner of spacecraft. Shackleton stated that after a phase of robotic prospecting, its crews will establish the infrastructure in space and basecamps in the lunar polar crater regions to supervise industrial machinery for mining, processing and transporting lunar products to market in Low Earth Orbit and beyond. The company said it will use a mix of industrial astronauts and advanced robotic systems to provide a strategically-assured, continuous supply of propellants for spacecraft."
Look, I'm good at doing stuff first, send me!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Perhaps Assimo will finally be put to work.
Perhaps I'm trolling, perhaps I'm not.
Too early for April Fool's, nitwits.
SEC team members have deeply embedded relationships at many levels within the international space community, industry, academia and NASA.
right. Deep connections to all those people, who can help with extracting a few bucks from the Fed. Why not? Everybody else is doing it.
You can't handle the truth.
My prediction: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_(film)
Moon base in 2020? So I've got 9 years to work on embellishing my CV.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
My name Kalic from the planet Klacktong.
Please tell me more about your Shackleton strategically-assured Low Earth Orbit lunar polar crater regions and beyond propellants for spacecraft and industrial astronauts and advanced robotic systems lunar base processing and transporting depot mix.
My only prayer is that they don't call the moonbase moonbase alpha and start storing nuclear waste on the other side of the moon. ... and that we don't recalibrate the calendar so that 2020 becomes renamed 1999.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
A lot of people own land on the moon and will sue you for trespassing on their mineral rights!
2020? These guys are either nuts or lying, maybe both. If they're not just total crackpots, then this is probably just trolling for VC dollars like that stupid flying car thing.
I read the internet for the articles.
How have they solved the problem of the abrasive Moon dust? It is really hard on bearings and even worse on lungs.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
I would be amazed if a private company managed, by 2020, so much as to land a man on the Moon, let alone build a permanent base there. But no, I'm too skeptical. No one would ever exaggerate the feasibility of such a venture just to bilk money from credulous investors. Especially not a much of middle-aged former NASA engineers who just got laid off due to the end of the shuttle program.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
And here NASA thinks that it will take 10 years until there's a mature enough technology to remotely build reusable landing fields on the moon, followed by another couple of years to actually build them. And that's for something in the warm areas, not the -220C cold permanently shadowed craters. There guys probably plan on ordering their equipment from Caterpillar and let the engines run overnight to make sure they stay warm (works in Alaska).
I'm aging rapidly, I bought a new game and had no idea if my machine was good for it.
So who owns the moon? I mean - will they have mineral rights licensed from someone? And is there an agreement as to who that might be? Sounds like a casus belli brewing.
[quote]The company said it will use a mix of industrial astronauts and advanced robotic systems[/quote]
Great, just what we need -- mass-produced clones having an existential break-down while being gently prodded on by a robot with the voice of Kevin Spacey.
I was excited about this, until I went to their "website". http://www.shackletonenergy.com/
What BS. Neither the technology nor the business plan is going to fly.
While I don't doubt that it's do-able, and that they may even be on the moon when they say they will, it seems a little bit early to me. I may be wrong about this as I only read space articles once in a while, but my impression is that they won't be pulling a profit for quite a while. Who's going to provide the volume of purchases necessary to turn a profit on a moon base?
TV: "In 2020 we'll land privately-owned vvehicles on the moon-"
Viewer:"Yaaaaaaaay"
TV" "-in order to rape its resources."
Viewer: "fuuuuuuuck"
Either way I got my laugh for the day.
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
www.lunarlandowner.com
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Bill Stone seems to be involved with this, which actually gives it some real vision. Check him out in a TED conference a few years back on just this sort of project. If you don't find his attitude inspiring, something is wrong with you... The relevant portion about the moon starts at 10:52 http://www.ted.com/talks/bill_stone_explores_the_earth_and_space.html
Great. As if "fracking" (NOT the Galactica kind...) isn't bad enough, somebody wants to screw with the moon and risk screwing up tides, etc....
HOOOO BOY! Someone got exposed to lethal quantities of 1960s over optimism! And probably is getting lot$ of VC funding... Just like Solaren, you'll never hear from this again, except in the fraud section of Google News!
"Your comment violated the "postersubj" compression filter. Try less whitespace and/or less repetition in the subject line."
not.
I saw 2001: a Space Odyssey. You just don't know what you'll find.
1. Cook up a crazy scheme that seems half-way plausible
2. Get investment money from some foolish investors
3. Play with rockets and science stuff and then revise timeline when your deadline nears.
4. Goto 1
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Destination time in the immediate future. No website to speak of. Using crowdsourcing/crowdfunding. Press release contains a misuse of "it's" when "its" should have been used. Color me skeptical.
Anyone who has watched a mine, and a refinery, or even seen pictures of them, is qualified to question the validity of the time frame here. All that industrial process activity, in an environment with no atmosphere to speak of and reduced gravity ?
... but operating by 2020 ?
Kudos for thinking big and bold, and the value of whatever solutions do emerge
Not gonna happen.
In their defense, you could have said the same thing back in the late 70s about PCs.
Those companies aren't going to take the risk. They'll let somebody else do it and, if those people are successful, they'll buy them out.
We're whalers on the Moon, we carry a harpoon. But there ain't no whales so we tell tall tales and sing our whaling tune.
They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance. - Terry Pratchett
When I first saw the article, I flashed on Heinlein, then "Destination Moon", the first movie I saw, back in 1951.
Seems to me that what Bill Stone is setting out to do is the kind of thing any real nerd would give his left nut to do, be involved in, or see happen. I may be getting too cynical (I think many here are, or have already arrived) but I'd like to see this work. Wouldn't hurt to have a modern-day Delos Harriman or three backing this. I think too many forget that humans invent their own future. One may observe - avidly or idly, participate, or scoff.
For those who didn't click through the links: http://www.stoneaerospace.com/news-/news-mining-moon.php
(Thanks for the hippie quiz. It brought back a few memories. 114)
Not sure if mexicans are cool with space travel.
Can't be that much different than sneaking across the border stuffed in the dashboard of an '86 Nova.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
So by 2030 if we have not nuked ourselves out of existence then we should all be able to visit Luna Park in our personal spaceships and sleep with the lone farmers robot daughter.
They aren't "energy companies." They are mining companies that mine fossil fuels. That is why they will never be involved in renewable resources. It just has nothing to do with their core business. When the Earth runs out of things for them to mine, they'll just have to try to mine the moon.
Democracy Now! - your daily, uncensored, corporate-free
"Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means. "
The US is a signatory, which makes this law for any US registered company. How long the treaty remains viable is another question.
Bottom line, if there was any profitability in it, Exxon, shell, BP, Citgo, etc. etc. would have already done it.
Hmm, I wonder what that would be like...
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
"To make this ambitious plan possible, the company this week said it had begun its initial fundraising campaign via a company called RocketHub which defines itself as a crowdfunding outfit that helps raise money for a variety of entrepreneurial pursuits."
If every human on Earth gave them a dollar, they wouldn't have enough to do this. We're talking about settling the moon AND having steady traffic back and forth AND manufacturing using lunar materials...a trifecta of things that have never been done, and all within the space of 8 years? Oh, and by the way...where are the rockets that stop at the moon for fuel heading off to? We don't have half the challenges of interplanetary travel (even if we had so much as a couch to sleep on once we got there) solved, and by the time something is in LEO or higher, the majority of fuel consumption is over with, so refueling is kind of a waste of time.
So, to review...it looks to me like they're asking everyone to give them some money so they can do this incredibly hard thing on a very short timeline that will get them up and running with a lunar gas station that nobody will need yet. I say they're pulling a Moller/Phantom.
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
Project will probably be canceled because some astro-enviromentalist detected a spor on a moon rock that can live in a vacuum.
boom goes the dynamite....
Is that why Exxon made the iPhone? Lunar mining has nothing to do with the core business of any of those companies. You do realise there are no hydrocarbon lakes on the moon?
Or is that mooooooned? Ah! Mining shmining! Whatever!
Imagine the industrial dust coud from that! Mostly escaping NLO and tagging along into NEO. Probably in the wake of the supply craft.
Get ready for the hot and cold flashes from solar reflection / shading. And the itty-bitty storm activity. "Perhaps".Just a theory. Not proven. etc.
Pave the moon with a solid surface!
Take focused sunlight (radiation), and combine moondust with other binding elements and slowly melt/solidify/ceramitize the surface. Do this where necessary, and we know have solid platforms on which to travel, and build infrastructure.
Is it truly cheaper to get liquid oxygen and liquid nitrogen on the moon vs. on the Earth?
These are apparently expensive to make here and may exist already frozen on the moon. OK, but you have to design/build/destroy/redesign/rebuild rockets and robots, hire gobs of people, send them to space, get everything insured, run the operation, send the stuff back, burn up a lot of fuel and consumables, and then once it gets here, keep it cold (which I'm guessing takes lots of energy).
So even using back-of-envelope math, does that pencil out? I'm assuming some of it is paid for by taxing people.
Advice: on VPS providers
"To make this ambitious plan possible, the company this week said it had begun its initial fundraising campaign via a company called RocketHub which defines itself as a crowdfunding outfit that helps raise money for a variety of entrepreneurial pursuits."
In other news, I have decided to build a robot army to take over the world and build fusion power plants, donations welcome! lol. In the aerospace industry without funding you're just another in a LONG list of dreamers with a bunch of untried concepts. Maybe the Shackleton people are less utterly vapor than some, but the chances of anything like this getting off the ground are 1000's to 1 against. I think the business plan is vastly overoptimistic in its cost analysis, and the question still remains who would be the customers for all this rocket fuel? Truthfully, having been in the business of building rockets, this stuff is way harder and way more expensive than even most of the people in the industry are wont to estimate when it is their own project.
Not that I don't hope they can pull it off, but they're going to need 50-100 billion to do it, and I'm pretty much doubting they're going to crowdsource the GDP of most of sub-saharan Africa... Good luck to them though.
"Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem." -- Jefferson
My main concern is that no taxpayer subsidies be involved. If they want to set up their vast lunar mining industry, fine. Don't expect me to pay for even a tiny bit of it so that a handful of rich assholes can bask in luxury and privilege. VCs should fund all of it.
I am an indigenous aboriginal person and any grant of mineral rights should include compensation to my tribe (the "Humans") as the moon is our collective property and any use of it could potentially damage it and affect its prominent role in my culture. The moon features prominently in the traditions of my people from dances (the Moonwalk) to courting and romantic rituals (the honeymoon) and cuisine (cheese). I propose that any private commercial venture be submitted to approval by vote by a base majority of my tribe (7 billion+ members) and that revenues from any commercial venture be distributed equally to each member.
The company said it will use a mix of industrial astronauts and advanced robotic systems to provide a strategically-assured, continuous supply of propellants for spacecraft.
Did anyone else read this as the "industrial astronauts and advanced robotic systems" will be used as "a continuous supply of propellants for spacecraft?"
there is no spoon. or fork. there is a butter knife, and it's dull.
Naw, space is for the Pygmies. You can pack them in tighter places, they weight less, and they don't consume as much.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
Yeah, and this whole "horseless carriage" fad is sure to blow over too, since none of the big buggy manufacturers have started building them.
Yes be careful the Nazis are hiding in the moon
http://www.ironsky.net/
On a more serious note. I think I have a book from the 80s that thought moon mining was possible.
So yeah 30 years later why not.
From the site:
and
FFS, Wallace and Gromitt have a more credible interplanetary space program.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Who owns the moon? Hasn't it been 'claimed' by the US and Russians ( perhaps more .. )?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Men wanted for Hazardous Journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success.
Not without my technology to ensure they can stay fed on the moon with very minimal power.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Have we not learned from H.G Wells an "The Time Machine"? Good Lord....here come the Morlocks...."The demolitions for the lunar colony screwed up the orbit, okay? The moon's breaking up, all right? Now, come on"
"It has become appallingly clear that our technology has surpassed our humanity." - Albert Einstein
This must be the start of the PTMC. Can't wait. 20 more years after mining maybe the robots will be infected with a virus, and they will pay a single guy to try to destroy the mining facilities named the material defender.
don't you know the famous Mexican astronaut José Jiménez? He was the second man ever to go in space, just after Yuri Gagarin.
I've been saying this for a few years now, check out some of my recent posts, it's the obvious answer to the human colonisation of space. Instead of the dangerous practice of lifting fuel out of the earth's gravity well, use the fuel that is already up there, to reach and leave escape velocity.
Attaining and leaving escape velocity in the vacuum of space is much safer and cheaper, doing this with fuel from the moon makes it so.
It's called an elephant's trunk whereas it is in fact, an elephant's nose, a nose by any other name would smell as sweet
Even if they had everything needed researched and designed so they could start immedietly, getting that much stuff to the Moon would still require at least 50 years and cost much morte they claim it would. This is a scam to collect funding.
Welcome to the enrichment center. Since making test participation mandatory for all employees, the quality of our test subjects has risen dramatically. Employee retention, however, has not. As a result, you may have heard we're gonna phase out human testing. There's still a few things left to wrap up though - first up, conversion gel. Now, the beancounters told me we literally could not afford to buy $7 worth of moon rocks, much less 70 million. Bought 'em anyway. Ground them up, mixed them into a gel, and guess what: ground-up moon rocks are pure poison.
let me know, lol. 1/3 of the human race lives on less than $3 a day in case you hadn't noticed....
The problem is if you had a $100 bn investment that had a reasonably high probability of success and a clear economic case in favor then sure it is a BIG project but quite possible. In this case there's no realistically viable economic argument and the risk premium is probably well over 10x. Your cost of financing is going to be something like 30% a year. So unless you can come up with a scenario under which you're generating a cashflow on the order a $1 tn/yr you have no business. The entire space industry isn't worth that much, so clearly this is utterly infeasible from a business standpoint.
Don't get me wrong. I think it would be very cool and a great adventure. It is simply so many orders of magnitude from any kind of economic viability that basing a business on it is pure fantasy. I realize Shackleton has convinced themselves otherwise, but people are quite good at doing that. Sadly reality is going to squish them, probably LONG before they even launch anything.
"Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem." -- Jefferson
I think too many forget that humans invent their own future.
Subject to the constraints of reality. We haven't worked out how to live for ever/a very very long time yet, which you'd think would be top of the list.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Shackleton is an impact crater that lies at the south pole of the Moon. The crater is named after Ernest Shackleton, a noted Anglo-Irish explorer of the Antarctic. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shackleton_(crater)
-- The best way to accelerate a computer running Windows is at 9.8 m/s^2.