Comment Cost is relative to location (Score 1) 265
The problem with this study is that it presumes that the materials collected will be used on earth. The idea behind Planetary Resources is that they would be used in space.
A bottle of water costs what? $1 maybe $2. The cost to put that bottle of water into space can range from $1,000 to $10,000. If Planetary Resources can find some asteroids with ice, extracting the water is not that difficult a task. The problem is getting the machine for mining into place because putting things into orbit is so crazy expensive.
Even if it costs them $5000 per litre to mine water they can still make a profit. Not because water itself it expensive, but because putting it into space is.