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Seriously? This is who is most likely going to be running against Obama?

Gee, where is that money going to come from? It's only going to cost $2 TRILLION Dollars!

Believe it or don't, I'm not a fan of Obama. Didn't vote for him last time, won't vote for him this time, but come on, how the hell can anyone who is worried about government spending vote for a republican candidate who wants to spend $2TRILLION dollars on a moon base?


I wonder how the thread would look on here if it was Obama proposing the moon colony.......

I agree Imaposer, I am not a registered republican but I was embarassed to see that headline. I WOULD however LOVE to see us do that on the moon but first I want to see Pontiac Michigan producing a chit load of cars again. Or maybe a chit load of spacevehicles.

Hmm, maybe he is on to something.

Naaa, that last sentence must be the Mojito talking

Newt is going to the wrong rock!

Watching "GoldRush" on Discovery Channel and they think the asteroid "Eros" has a lot of gold in it.

Cool, didn't know that Pop-o

E_HILLMAN wrote:I WOULD however LOVE to see us do that on the moon

I would too. Space exploration is probably the only solution to quite a few long terms problems we face on this rock.

Watching "GoldRush" on Discovery Channel and they think the asteroid "Eros" has a lot of gold in it.

And there ya go! This is something that should be done with private funding. So far, nothing to do with space exploration has any potential for a worthwhile return on investment, so it's only been governments who spent any money on it. We need more reasons for businesses to start looking at space as a potential jackpot to get them to start spending their own money on trying to get there.

imaposer wrote:

E_HILLMAN wrote:I WOULD however LOVE to see us do that on the moon

I would too. Space exploration is probably the only solution to quite a few long terms problems we face on this rock.

Watching "GoldRush" on Discovery Channel and they think the asteroid "Eros" has a lot of gold in it.

And there ya go! This is something that should be done with private funding. So far, nothing to do with space exploration has any potential for a worthwhile return on investment, so it's only been governments who spent any money on it. We need more reasons for businesses to start looking at space as a potential jackpot to get them to start spending their own money on trying to get there.

I don't think this has any potential for a return on investment either. Not sure how many pounds of gold an unmanned or even a manned flight to Eros could lift off and return to earth with, but I'm betting not enough to pay for the mission. Seems like we only returned a total of 88 pounds of moon rock to earth during all the Apollo missions to the moon.

If true...88 pounds of GOLD! (or more)

Nervous Wreck wrote:If true...88 pounds of GOLD! (or more)

A total of 88 pounds of moon rocks in all the Apollo missions combined. Probably no more than 15 pounds or so in any one mission. But....even at $1,500 an ounce for the price of gold, 16 ounces x $1,500 = $24,000 per pound for the gold, so 88 pounds of gold would only fetch about 2.1 million $$$ at those prices.

I was wrong on the 88 pounds part. Just looked it up and they brought back a total of 842 pounds from all the Apollo missions combined. Don't know where I came up with 88 pounds at. Anyway, at $24,000 per pound that's only 20.2 million for 842 pounds. Still far from being a profitable venture.

I've always thought Newt is a genius who tends to say stupid stuff. I'm starting to believe he is smoking better green than I am. Sometimes you think about crazy or funny stuff but you don't say it or tell enyone!!

kdfwr911 wrote:I was wrong on the 88 pounds part. Just looked it up and they brought back a total of 842 pounds from all the Apollo missions combined. Don't know where I came up with 88 pounds at. Anyway, at $24,000 per pound that's only 20.2 million for 842 pounds. Still far from being a profitable venture.

So how much does it cost for 'gas'!

Depending on which figures you want to believe, it could be in the ball park of 1.3 billion per launch just to get into Earth orbit and back home aboard the space shuttle.

1.3b is bs for getting into orbit. If that was the case you would not have 97% of satellites out there. It can be done cheaper.

E_HILLMAN wrote:1.3b is bs for getting into orbit. If that was the case you would not have 97% of satellites out there. It can be done cheaper.

That figure is derived from dividing the total cost of the space shuttle program over it's entire lifetime (including all development costs) by the total number of launches. The figures are from 2005 so it could be off a little if recalculated today.

The shuttle was a high dollar ticket. Most still use the single rocket system.

E_HILLMAN wrote:Most still use the single rocket system.

But they can't mine gold and then liftoff a second time to return a payload to Earth. To mine Eros for gold would require returning enough payload to Earth to make the mission profitable......not to mention off setting the R&D costs associated with the technological challenges.

Hmm, maybe we could use laser technology to propel things back and fourth...

Well, you guys made me look it up!

fuel cost: $450 million (per mission)

ref:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does ... uttle_cost

another interesting site:
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/abo ... e_faq.html

Nervous Wreck wrote:Well, you guys made me look it up!

fuel cost: $450 million (per mission)

ref:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does ... uttle_cost

another interesting site:
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/abo ... e_faq.html

I saw those numbers yesterday too. That's approximately how much it costs in fuel and other costs to launch an existing space shuttle orbitor without taking into account all the other costs associated with the overall shuttle program. The 1.3 billion figure is the total cost of the entire shuttle program over it's lifetime, including all buildings required, all R&D costs and salaries etc, divided by the total number of launches. However, we don't have a off the shelf vehicle to go to Eros to mine gold, so it would have to be built from the ground up just like the space shuttle program was.