Asteroids vs Planetary Mines

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

At TL9, it costs $5,000 per ton to move stuff from LEO to the surface of the Earth, so anything with a value of more than $50/lb will likely be worth shipping down the gravity well. This includes silver, gold, and platinum group metals, as well as advanced electronics, medical instruments, and pharmaceutical drugs.

Good observation, but a slight correction: anything with a difference in value of more than $50/lb between earth and space will be shipped down the gravity well. So if you don't get $50 worth of savings from doing it in space, it will stay on earth.


The precious metals probably hit the $50/lb of savings, but I don't know if you get those savings on pharmaceutical drugs. At least not most of them, especially because a lot of precursor chemicals will be down on earth.