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How much of a threat is underwater ocean mining?

MeltdownMeltdown Posts: 8,789 ✭✭✭✭✭
in Precious Metals
With all the tv shows & hype lately about the potential, how big of a threat do you take it?
Let's face it, scarcity is the bottom line factor for the price of gold. Is underwater mining really that big of a threat?
The simple math of land vs. underwater ground seems to be a compelling argument.

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Comments

  • 500Bay500Bay Posts: 1,106 ✭✭✭
    'Someday' underwater gold mining might be a factor in finding new supplies of gold. The logistics are still too tough to make it viable, and the costs are just too high.
    Finem Respice
  • derrybderryb Posts: 36,788 ✭✭✭✭✭
    supply of dollars will ensure gold's place in the market

    "Interest rates, the price of money, are the most important market. And, perversely, they’re the market that’s most manipulated by the Fed." - Doug Casey

  • OnlyGoldIsMoneyOnlyGoldIsMoney Posts: 3,358 ✭✭✭✭✭
    High costs, safey issues and environmental regulations = Not any time soon
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  • PerryHallPerryHall Posts: 46,111 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>High costs, safey issues and environmental regulations = Not any time soon >>



    What enviornmental regulations are there in the middle of the ocean?

    Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
    "Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
    "Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire

  • tneigtneig Posts: 1,505 ✭✭✭
    I hope it gets harder and harder to mine so the gold goes up.

    Oh, no, not really for the working or investing folks...

    But at some point its just not cost effective anymore except for the small fry in a stream with a pan.

    I suspect the amount being mined is not significantly adding to the size of the big pile anymore.
    COA
  • DoubleEagle59DoubleEagle59 Posts: 8,307 ✭✭✭✭✭
    To answer the OP's question:

    Yes...if you're talking about the environment.

    No...if you're referring to the price of Gold.
    "Gold is money, and nothing else" (JP Morgan, 1912)

    "“Those who sacrifice liberty for security/safety deserve neither.“(Benjamin Franklin)

    "I only golf on days that end in 'Y'" (DE59)
  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,303 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>

    << <i>High costs, safety issues and environmental regulations = Not any time soon >>



    What enviornmental regulations are there in the middle of the ocean? >>




    We already have gold mines on land 3 miles deep and 3 miles high and those conditions are particularly challenging. 2-6 miles deep in the ocean must be even more rugged.
    Miners are now having to go through 2X the ore they did 10 yrs ago to find the same amount of gold. No one has made a move into the ocean yet. It's hard enough to find
    financing for mines built on land...and many of those are being squeezed hard by escalating costs.
    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold
  • Timbuk3Timbuk3 Posts: 11,658 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Sounds profitable but highly dangerous !!!
    Timbuk3
  • fastrudyfastrudy Posts: 2,096 ✭
    A greater threat to the price of gold resides in the two firms that have announced they will start mining near-Earth asteroids by 2015. The Earth is a differentiated planet. All of the heavy elements (gold) sank to the center early in Earth's life. The gold currently mined was placed in the Earth's crust during a period of asteroid bombardment. If we could take the gold out of the Earth's core and re-distribute it evenly on the Earth's surface, it would cover the Earth to a depth of six feet. Now some asteroids are from broken apart differentiated planets. Find one from a differentiated planet's core and the price of gold drops like rib bones at a Baptist barbeque. 2015....TWO companies....
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  • OverdateOverdate Posts: 7,007 ✭✭✭✭✭
    << A greater threat to the price of gold resides in the two firms that have announced they will start mining near-Earth asteroids by 2015. >>

    Another reason to buy silver instead. At today's prices it would not be profitable to mine the oceans or the asteroids for silver.

    My Adolph A. Weinman signature :)

  • DoubleEagle59DoubleEagle59 Posts: 8,307 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>A greater threat to the price of gold resides in the two firms that have announced they will start mining near-Earth asteroids by 2015. The Earth is a differentiated planet. All of the heavy elements (gold) sank to the center early in Earth's life. The gold currently mined was placed in the Earth's crust during a period of asteroid bombardment. If we could take the gold out of the Earth's core and re-distribute it evenly on the Earth's surface, it would cover the Earth to a depth of six feet. Now some asteroids are from broken apart differentiated planets. Find one from a differentiated planet's core and the price of gold drops like rib bones at a Baptist barbeque. 2015....TWO companies.... >>



    Cost-wise, ocean mining would be dirt cheap compared to mining asteroids.

    I don't think in 2015 we'll be seeing asteroid mining.

    I just can't see it being both economical and practicable.
    "Gold is money, and nothing else" (JP Morgan, 1912)

    "“Those who sacrifice liberty for security/safety deserve neither.“(Benjamin Franklin)

    "I only golf on days that end in 'Y'" (DE59)
  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,303 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Do we send Bruce Willis' team up to mine the asteroids or maybe a bunch of big board surfer dudes?

    If a surfer got to Gilligan's Island on a tsunami, no reason they couldn't surf an asteroid as it approached earth.
    We did bring back some moon rocks from the Apollo missions. How much gold was in those rocks?
    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold
  • bronco2078bronco2078 Posts: 10,211 ✭✭✭✭✭


    Doesn't seawater supposedly contain some tiny percentage of gold?


    Perhaps it could be strained out?
  • fastrudyfastrudy Posts: 2,096 ✭
    If a corporation sends up an asteroid miner, you can be certain that all minerals (incuding ice) will be mined for profit. Ice can be separated into hydrogen {for fuel} and oxygen {for breathing or to burn fuel} by solar energy.
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  • fishcookerfishcooker Posts: 3,446 ✭✭
    The $/lb to achieve escape velocity is far more than digging around on the ocean bottom.
  • fastrudyfastrudy Posts: 2,096 ✭
    As are the rewards
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  • OverdateOverdate Posts: 7,007 ✭✭✭✭✭
    If an asteroid is small enough, couldn't it be towed/pushed into an orbit around Earth and mined from there? That might be more profitable than several round trips to the asteroid belt.

    My Adolph A. Weinman signature :)

  • BaleyBaley Posts: 22,660 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Just about everything technological today was science fiction a generation or two ago... and there's a lot of science fiction about asteroid and undersea mining (we already drill the ocean floor for petroleum) so while I do not expect space or deepsea to produce significant PM mining in the near future, we may very well live to see it.

    it might take robots that fly out, attach to the asteroid, and are programmed to build more robots using the asteroid material, and those robots would do the mining... but there's a lot of science fiction about such plans going bad (robots achieve AI and turn on the humans) so they'd better be careful image

    Liberty: Parent of Science & Industry

  • OverdateOverdate Posts: 7,007 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Recent article on asteroid mining.

    My Adolph A. Weinman signature :)

  • OnlyGoldIsMoneyOnlyGoldIsMoney Posts: 3,358 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>

    << <i>High costs, safey issues and environmental regulations = Not any time soon >>



    What enviornmental regulations are there in the middle of the ocean? >>




    Perhaps none now. If deep ocean mining ever appeared to be viable the regulations would quickly follow.
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  • OnlyGoldIsMoneyOnlyGoldIsMoney Posts: 3,358 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>Doesn't seawater supposedly contain some tiny percentage of gold?


    Perhaps it could be strained out? >>




    Germany's Fritz Haber (1918 Nobel Laureate) thought that he could develop a means of harvesting gold from seawater to pay the huge reparations obligation imposed by the Versailles Treaty. It was not practicable.
    NO END IN SIGHT LIB $2.50'S CAC ONLY
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  • DoubleEagle59DoubleEagle59 Posts: 8,307 ✭✭✭✭✭
    This asteroid mining is just never going to happen.

    Just think of the cost of such a mining and recovery endeavor and the technology and precision needed in doing so.

    It's way out there (pardon the pun).

    Did Kramer think of this or was it his bladder invention for the oil tankers?

    and please...don't lose any sleep thinking the price of gold will be crashing soon because of this asteroid 'oversupply'.

    "Gold is money, and nothing else" (JP Morgan, 1912)

    "“Those who sacrifice liberty for security/safety deserve neither.“(Benjamin Franklin)

    "I only golf on days that end in 'Y'" (DE59)
  • fastrudyfastrudy Posts: 2,096 ✭
    This asteroid mining is just never going to happen
    I will give you some time to change this statement. Go ahead, take as much time as you need.
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  • ibzman350ibzman350 Posts: 5,315 ✭
    <<drops like rib bones at a Baptist barbeque>>

    image


    Herb
    Remember it's not how you pick your nose that matters, it's where you put the boogers.
    imageimageimage
  • PerryHallPerryHall Posts: 46,111 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>

    << <i>

    << <i>High costs, safey issues and environmental regulations = Not any time soon >>



    What enviornmental regulations are there in the middle of the ocean? >>




    Perhaps none now. If deep ocean mining ever appeared to be viable the regulations would quickly follow. >>



    Who would make these regulations and who would enforce them? The UN?

    Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
    "Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
    "Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire

  • OnlyGoldIsMoneyOnlyGoldIsMoney Posts: 3,358 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>

    << <i>

    << <i>

    << <i>High costs, safey issues and environmental regulations = Not any time soon >>



    What enviornmental regulations are there in the middle of the ocean? >>




    Perhaps none now. If deep ocean mining ever appeared to be viable the regulations would quickly follow. >>



    Who would make these regulations and who would enforce them? The UN? >>





    Our current regime would be glad to assign such power for regulation writing to the UN. Enforcement would be a detail to work out.
    NO END IN SIGHT LIB $2.50'S CAC ONLY
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  • sebrownsebrown Posts: 424 ✭
    New National Geographic Article on deep-sea mining. It appears as though the metals aren't that difficult to find as they are "spread along the seafloor, where natural hydrothermal vents eject rich concentrations of metals and minerals."

    As for the just how much gold is down there? Well.....

    " While different vent systems contain varying concentrations of precious minerals, the deep sea contains enough mineable gold that there's nine pounds (four kilograms) of it for every person on Earth, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Ocean Service."

    "In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation [...] Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights." - Alan Greenspan
  • GrumpyEdGrumpyEd Posts: 4,749 ✭✭✭
    I don't think ocean or space mining will be economically viable at least for a long time.

    Reminds me of the Glomar Explorer supposedly mining manganese nodules from the ocean floor in the 70s.
    Of course they were really mining for the K129 sub:

    Wiki link about GSF and mining cover story

    Wiki link about project


    Ed
  • BAJJERFANBAJJERFAN Posts: 31,082 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Why go to all of that risk and hassle so that some dork can have a common gold coin?
    theknowitalltroll;
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