Skeptic Check: Asteroid Mining

Big Picture Science

Science, Technology

4.6 • 986 Ratings

🗓️ 31 March 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Asteroids are rich in precious metals and other valuable resources. But mining them presents considerable challenges. We discuss these, and consider how these spinning, rocky resources might be the key to a space-faring future. But an economist points out the consequences of bringing material back to Earth, and a scientist raises an ethical question; do we have an obligation to keep the asteroids intact for science? Guests: Jim Bell - Planetary scientist in the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University. Martin Elvis - Astronomer and author of “Asteroids: How Love, Fear, and Greed Will Determine Our Future in Space.” Ian Lange - Economist and associate professor at the Colorado School of Mines and author of a paper on the feasibility of asteroid mining. Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake Originally aired March 18, 2024 You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support! Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact [email protected] to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:44.8	on Apple, Spotify, Amazon,
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0:49.3	Music Astronomers like me value asteroids for the clues they hold to the formation of our solar system.
1:06.5	In popular culture, however, space rocks are often bad guys.
1:11.6	Now, we get hit all the time by rocks and meteors.
1:15.6	Some of them the size of cars, some no bigger than your hand.
1:19.6	But this comet is larger than Mount Everest.
1:22.6	It weighs 500 billion tons.
1:26.6	But asteroids may be getting a bum-wrapped because they are, in fact, extremely valuable to everyone, not just astronomers.
1:34.6	Asteroids contain vast amounts of useful materials such as iron, precious metals, and maybe most important water.
1:41.5	In the face of fears about the finite resources on Earth, there is a
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