NASA discovers metal asteroid worth $10,000 quadrillion

[jayem]

It’s named 16 Psyche, and it’s in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. It’s the size of West Virginia, and it’s composed almost entirely of iron and nickel. At current metal prices, it’s worth $10,000 quadrillion (or $10 quintillion.)

Pretty cool.

NASA Discovers a Rare Metal Asteroid That’s Worth $10,000,000,000,000,000,000

 

[Halbhh]

It’s named 16 Psyche, and it’s in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. It’s the size of West Virginia, and it’s composed almost entirely of iron and nickel. At current metal prices, it’s worth $10,000 quadrillion (or $10 quintillion.)

Pretty cool.

NASA Discovers a Rare Metal Asteroid That’s Worth $10,000,000,000,000,000,000

heh heh. Only on the order of 100,000+ years of total Global GDP.

This discovery Psyche was a planet core was a while back ya know (back earlier in the decade), but a lot of fun.

 

[zippy2006]

Steer that sucker towards Earth. We could be rich!

 

[Moral Orel]

Steer that sucker towards Earth. We could be rich!

 

[Ophiolite]

It’s the size of West Virginia

For UK readers, that's just slightly larger than Wales.

At current metal prices, it’s worth $10,000 quadrillion

Of course, if said iron and nickel become accessible then current metal prices plummet. Much like an incoming asteroid.

 

[dqhall]

heh heh. Only on the order of 100,000+ years of total Global GDP.

This discovery Psyche was a planet core was a while back ya know (back earlier in the decade), but a lot of fun.

The cost of jet fuel would eliminate any chance of space mining and transport profit.

 

[durangodawood]

For UK readers, that's just slightly larger than Wales.

I do NOT want us to get slammed by an asteroid the size of a whale.

 

[Desk trauma]

The cost of jet fuel would eliminate any chance of space mining and transport profit.

Introducing that kind of glut to any commodity market would end its profitability.

 

[Halbhh]

Introducing that kind of glut to any commodity market would end its profitability.

Just guessing, but at the moment it would be vastly more expensive I bet to get much nickel and iron from there to here than to just dig up more ore down here and refine it here. Cost per ton I bet local producers would vastly be cheaper anytime in next few decades. Practically using that metal would depend on a very advanced infrastructure up there in space, in some future time where mining from there would make sense for using the metal out there in future constructions, which is very much a science fiction far future fantasy kind of thing at the moment, where residing out in the asteroid belt would be common enough to build large stuff out of metals out there in the belt.

 

[John Done]

What makes it special is that unlike most asteroids - stone or ice - Psyche is almost entirely composed of metals, like the core of the Earth. It is believed that Psyche is a dead core left by a planet that was never able to form during the birth of the solar system, or was destroyed as a result of many violent collisions in the distant past.

 

[Ophiolite]

What makes it special is that unlike most asteroids - stone or ice - Psyche is almost entirely composed of metals, like the core of the Earth. It is believed that Psyche is a dead core left by a planet that was never able to form during the birth of the solar system, or was destroyed as a result of many violent collisions in the distant past.

Just to be consistent with terminology we would better refer to it as the core of a protoplanet, rather than that of a planet.

 

[Noxot]

Good building material for whatever robots or human space stations that might exist in the future.

Mining Mars seems more plausible though, closer to our present at least. After all we will have colonies on Mars.

 

[Astrophile]

It’s named 16 Psyche, and it’s in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. It’s the size of West Virginia, and it’s composed almost entirely of iron and nickel. At current metal prices, it’s worth $10,000 quadrillion (or $10 quintillion.)

Pretty cool.

NASA Discovers a Rare Metal Asteroid That’s Worth $10,000,000,000,000,000,000

16 Psyche was discovered by the Italian astronomer Annibale de Gasparis on 17th March 1851, quite a long time before NASA was founded. It was already classified as a metallic iron asteroid by 1979.

The dimensions of 16 Psyche are approximately 277×238×168 km³ - 16 Psyche - Wikipedia . Since the asteroid was discovered by an Italian astronomer, it is appropriate to say that it is about the size of Sicily.