Some mathematics....

[Tio_Holtzmann]

"The Harkonnens took ten billion solaris out of here every three hundred and thirty standard days." - Thufir Hawat

Spice is quoted in Dune as 620,000 solaris per decagram (10 grams)

That's 10,000,000,000/620,000=approximately 16,129 decagrams

Which is only 161.3 kilograms (about 400 pounds?)? I would have thought a harvester, judging by its size as given in the books could obtain that amount in no time. And yet it took the Harkonnens, a rich family, 330 days to get all that off world? (assuming a standard day is roughly equivalent in length to our day). Any thoughts or is this a discrepancy? Or were the Harkonnen just fiddling the books?

[Mahdi]

A lot of column a, a little bit of column b.

[Dunenewt]

Its very dilute as it is mixed in with the sand

[Tio_Holtzmann]

I don't think it is dilute though, the sandcrawler's exhaust column was sand being filtered out of the spice sucked up from the sand.

Kynes: "The cloud is vented sand being expelled after the spice has been centrifugally removed."

Sorry for getting into this extremely annoying habit of keeping Dune by the PC when I'm on the forums. Just don't like it when people misquote......

[Vanguard3000]

First, the spice was not dilute. The Harvesters were like the massive fishing ships that used to be fishing the Grand Banks back when a fish known as cod existed. They would catch, process, and can the fish on the ship. Similarly, the harvester "inhales" the raw spice from the sand, separates it (See Gridex Plane in the Terminology), and discharges the sand. But the harvesters would almost never get an entire load, as the sandworms would attack.

Now, keep in mind that Arrakis is the SOLE source of the Spice. Very little of it would stay with the Harkonnens (although they were making secret caches). Think of how much would go to the Spacing Guild alone, so that they may breathe it.

(*This post in memory of the cod. Poor bastards.*)

[nemafakei]

The pure spice essence (remember there's also dust and fines in the desert, finer than sand).

But I agree, it seemed a little bizarre to me when I read it. FH was probbly just making up the numbers as he went along. They're not really relevant.

[Tio_Holtzmann]

I would have thought the amount of spice they sold to the guild just to make enough spice gas for a navigator for a short while would have cost at least 10 billion solaris as it's compressed. Or maybe they were obliged to give it to the guild to obtain more shipping privileges.

Plus Rabban never was very good at the old administration!

[GhostHunter]

Or you may look at it from this perspective....Maybe Frank didn't pay attention to that one line mixed with the other one? Think about it, if you were making a novel (Dune in this case) would you really go from like page 1 and get a quote to page 45 and get a quote and do the math?

[Mahdi]

It's jsut another one of his mistakes in continuity. No novel that large and complex can escape them.

[Tio_Holtzmann]

True, he did a pretty damn fine job elsewhere in the book at continuity! Thank you.

[Shadout]

This is quite an old topic but...

Dune says that the price has been as high as 620000, it could be much less by the time of the Dune story.

Guess some sort of crisis could get the price extremly high.

So it doesnt have to be a mistake. But of course it could be.

[Inoculator9]

Does Dune ever state how much spice was necessary for an average family to get a few of the nice side-effects?

[Vanguard3000]

A mere sprinkle in a cup of coffee.  A dash.  A scoche.  Not much at all, really.

[thomas]

how dense is spice? I mean it could be extremely light and fine.  ???

probaly just an error

[Terror]

still, much more than was stated i think.... Otherwise i wonder how the fremen could gather the spice and actually make food out of it.

[Caid Ivik]

English is the only language, where one billion means 1000 millions. In most billion means 1 000 000 millions (1000 millions is one milliarde), so it would be 161 tons of spice, sand of this weight would need a whole train. And spice is much lighter than sand, I think.

[Dunenewt]

In England a billion is a million million.

[Inoculator9]

Well, as Vanguard said and I recalled, very little spice is needed for anything. I imagine a family would ration it out so thin that they could use a tiny amount for a year at a time.

[Terror]

the fremen bake cookies from spice.

[NHJ BV]

By the way, I think 10 billion is the profit House Harkonnen make annually. The costs of operating the harvesters, paying the workers, refining and transporting the spice are huge, so I think 10 billion profit all-in isn't that bad as it seems.

[Terror]

i think those costs should be nearly neglictable (i dunno how to write it) compared to the profit they should make.

[Inoculator9]

Inflation in Dune is sure to be different, who is to say that 10 billion solaris is essentially the same as 10 trillion dollars?

[Vanguard3000]

Keep in mind also that the Harkonnens are not mining the Spice for themselves; they do it on behalf of CHOAM, who takes the vast majority of the mined Spice.

Consider this:  Of all the Spice mined in any given time period, ninety-nine per cent of it could end up in the coffers of the Spacing Guild, who literally require it for their unavoidable services.  The remaining one per cent would be distributed to CHOAM, House Corrino, and anyone who could afford it (i.e. the Great Houses).  And, House Harkonnen would get their cut which, while the amount would be physically tiny compared to the gross extraction of Spice, would be worth a fortune.

And just to touch on how valuable the spice was:  Early on in Dune, it is said that a mere handfull of the Spice could buy a Great House sanctuary on Tupile.

[NHJ BV]

I agree with Vanguard. Although I think the costs of mining the spice should not be forgotten, harvesters are very expensive, not to mention the ornithopters, the crew, ost harvesters due to sandworms, and the large amount of maintenance that equipment requires on the harsh planet that is Arrakis.

[Emperor Harkonnen]

paying the workers,

eh...no.

ever heard of slave labour ;D  ;)