[Dead Corpse]

Again, you fail to take into account new technologies. You are very correct that if we used current solid/liquid heavy boosters to try to get first to orbit, and then out to the Belt... It'd be fantastically expensive and risky. I'm not debating that at all... In fact, I even posted two different links talking about cost/pound of getting things from ground to orbit and a comparison of existing boosters.

BUT... COMMA...

However, you are completely dismissing the promise of new technology that is now being tested both in labs on Earth and in orbit. Coupled with PRIVATE companies speculating on $2Q in potential returns? You'd have to be a complete Luddite lunatic to think they won't find a way...

DIY testers are currently building their own EM drive test rigs for around $10k. These units produce enough Newtons in thrust to out perform photon rockets and ion drives. Couple that with the fact that robotic mining probes aren't going to need a full science package like Cassini, won't have the fuel costs associated with other probes/missions, etc... The costs aren't nearly what you are portraying them as.

[from occupied ga]

New space drive technologies remind me of the promise of fusion power - always just 10 years away. I remember reading about ion propulsion 40 years ago and it was just around the corner then. If it’s proven to work then OK otherwise it’s just science fiction.