Could Space Mining be the Next Big Thing?
What do the USA, UAE, and Luxembourg have in common? Not much… apart from serious ambitions to mine celestial bodies.
It sounds like a long shot. It’s hard — and expensive — enough to launch a rocket into Earth’s orbit, let alone to land it on the moon or an asteroid and extracting its materials. But that’s exactly what these, and several other nations, plan on doing. If successful, it could be groundbreaking; no longer fully relying on our rare and delicate planet’s fast-depleting resources is a boon for sustaining life as we know it, and could provide the gateway for exploring and living in deep space (beyond the moon). And yet, the political implications are vast; aside from turning Earth’s economy on its head, vague laws regarding the use and ownership of space could lead to competition and conflict in the cosmos, possibly doing more harm than good.
All of this kind of depends on the actual ability to mine in space, which is proving to be quite tricky. To date, only three spacecraft have collected (and returned) samples from asteroids: Japan’s Hayabusa and the ongoing Hayabusa2, as well as NASA’s Stardust (NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission is expected to return samples in 2023). Even these purely scientific ventures are difficult enough, even though only a small sample extraction is needed; Hayabusa2 and OSIRIS-REx, for example, did not land on their respective asteroids but only hovered near its surface just long enough to collect the material (though Hayabusa2 deployed four small rovers — three of which functioned — to scout out its asteroid). The moon and Mars, meanwhile, have been drilled, also only for scientific purposes; the Apollo missions brought back samples, while material collected by NASA’s Perseverance rover will be returned to Earth by means of another dedicated mission.
Larger mining operations will need to be made of stronger stuff; however, apart from the above, no physical mechanism for the process exists. What this would look like will largely depend on the nature of the target body. Asteroids, one of the most promising sources of rare materials, come in many shapes, sizes, and compositions, usually classified in three main categories: S-types, M-types, and C-types.
S-types are stony asteroids, but also contain a relatively high amount of metal, especially platinum. M-types are even more metallic, and rarer, too. But while they are undoubtedly valuable, their density — especially that of M-types — combined with their small size and weak gravity causes landing and drilling to require vast amounts of energy; instead, magnets could be used to extract the metal, or, if the concentration is high enough, the whole asteroid could be redirected to a lunar orbit for further processing. Another method known as biomining involves using certain microbes to extract metals from the asteroid.
A good starting point for asteroid mining would be the C-types (carbonaceous chondrite), which are among the oldest objects in the solar system and the most abundant type of asteroid. They contain a high fraction of so-called hydrated minerals, meaning that it may be possible to mine water from them. A proposed method for this extraction could be optical mining; this involves using concentrated sunlight to ‘drill’ into the rock, exposing water, which is then collected in a bag. Alternately, as described here, the crumbly nature of C-types may make it possible to deposit its soil in containers, which would then be heated to collected the water vapor; this will become important for distant extraterrestrial colonies.
Though asteroids are lucrative targets in terms of their metal and water content, it is likely that mining will also occur in places humans are (eventually) going anyway: the moon and perhaps Mars. The moon’s main plus is its proximity to Earth; as opposed to bodies further away, there is only a 2.7 second delay in communications, meaning that the mining — which is likely to be remote, at least at first — is easier to oversee from Earth. Proposed mining methods are similar to those used on Earth, such as bucket-wheel excavation, a tunnel boring machine, or a kind of suction tube; though the moon’s gravity is about a sixth of that on Earth, it is nevertheless possible to land and function on its surface. On an asteroid, this would be a much more tedious and dangerous task.
Given that water and precious metals, though not in infinite supply, exist on Earth, and the technology to extract them from celestial sources simply isn’t there yet, why are certain countries so gung-ho about this far-fetched idea snatched from the pages of sci-fi? The short answer would be money, but the truth is more multifaceted.
Most obviously, bringing the precious metals hidden in the depths of space back to Earth would make anyone who brings them back rich beyond their wildest dreams; the commercial value of minerals in the asteroid belt alone would be enough to grant every single person on Earth $100 billion. The famous asteroid 16 Psyche alone could be worth around $10 quintillion alone, consisting of iron, nickel, and gold.
And while the costs of developing the technology — and carrying out missions — is considerable too, that blanches against the riches of the cosmos, which is predicted to become a trillion-dollar market. In a 2017 paper, Goldman Sachs estimates an ‘asteroid-grabbing’ spacecraft could be built for $2.6 billion: for context, this is a third of what has been invested in Uber. It is clear that once this becomes a reality, world economics will never be the same; precious metals, including those used in smartphones and medical equipment, could become infinitely cheaper, for example.
Space mining could positively affect the environment in that it would slow the incessant mining of Earth’s scarce resources. But it could also have a significant impact on energy. As the world slowly moves towards more sustainable sources, nuclear and solar power have been tossed around as possible solutions, but neither are without their problems. Space mining may bring about advancements in these fields, which would help negate the effects of climate change.
Lunar soil — called regolith — is rich in Helium-3, an isotope of helium possessing one less neutron than its normal configuration. The isotope is a product of cosmic radiation sweeping the lunar surface; Earth’s atmosphere prevents much of it forming on our planet. It might prove to be the key for nuclear fusion, an efficient and safe alternative to the fission commonly used in power plants.
Fusion — which is what powers the sun — involves the fusing of two light atoms, as opposed to nuclear fission used in power plants, which splits heavier atoms. Fusion releases four times as much energy than fission, and would not carry the risk of a radioactive meltdown; unlike fission, which is based on a chain reaction that can easily get out of hand, fusion simply comes to a halt instead of blowing up a city. But it comes with its own set of problems, including that until recently, scientists could not create an energy surplus. Still, Helium-3, which the moon has around 1.1 million metric tons of, could help power planetary colonies in the distant future.
We also already have our own personal nuclear fusion reactor hanging over us every day: the sun. Its power is already being harnessed on Earth and by spacecraft; on the moon (or even an asteroid), it could power both colonies and our home base. In a process known as in-situ resource utilization — ‘local’ (in this case extraterrestrial) materials being used for sustenance in space — lunar resources could be used to create solar cells; Blue Origin recently created both solar cells and electrical wires using simulated regolith. As the moon has no weather or atmosphere, the energy collected could be substantial, and beamed down to Earth by means of small satellites (in contrast to the more conventional proposal of space-based solar power, involving large solar cells in Earth’s orbit that could contribute to space debris). The Japanese firm Shimizu Corporation has suggested similar plans.
Speaking of energy, space travel itself is no small effort, requiring dizzying amounts of fuel just to get off the planet. When one adds people into the equation, it gets even harder. Not only the people themselves but the life support, radiation protection, and everything humans need to survive in the dead vacuum of space add to the cargo load, increasing the fuel needed to lift off. Even if the rocket refuels in orbit, the moon or Mars is just about the furthest it could go unless nuclear propulsion is developed further.
Mining could allow rocket propellant — oxygen and hydrogen (occasionally methane) — to be produced in-situ. Water harvested from asteroids or the lunar poles could potentially be split into hydrogen and oxygen, the liquid forms of which are often used to power rockets. On Mars, CO2 in the atmosphere could be used to create methane, which also works as rocket fuel. When combined with the energy breakthroughs possible with space mining and methods of in-situ infrastructure, independent colonies on the moon, Mars, and beyond start to look distantly doable. While this is a crucial step in space exploration, potentially allowing humans to explore further than ever before, the commercial viability of in-situ resource utilization is not to be overlooked either.
The satellite industry is projected to grow by 1,000% in the next decade, and for good reason; not only do the machines allow for better surveillance of weather, natural disasters, and conflict zones, but they also provide a means of peeking at factories to predict stock prices. That would be significant even without their role in television, internet, GPS, and radio. With the rise in cheap, reusable rockets and relatively affordable satellites, Earth’s orbit is becoming increasingly thick with them. But when their mission is over, they add to the growing problem of space debris as they can no longer be maneuvered to avoid other objects. Keeping space-sourced propellant in orbit to save on launch costs, as well as developments in In-Space Servicing, Assembly, and Manufacturing (ISAM), could allow satellites to refuel, extend their lifespan, and prevent the creation of more debris.
The tempting possibilities of space mining have not evaded certain countries’ radars; Luxembourg, for example, created its own space agency in 2018 for exactly this purpose. As stated here, the government ‘has committed to invest in the capital of [international] companies’ as officials aim to create a ‘Silicon Valley’ for space mining, also passing laws ensuring that anything brought back from space — like a piece of an asteroid — belongs to the company in question.
The US, of course, wants in on the action too, passing similar laws in 2015 and 2020 granting Americans the full rights to their obtained space resources; most eerily, 2020’s Executive Order on Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space Resources states that ‘the United States does not view [space] as a global commons’. The UAE also issued their own space resource ownership law in 2019, aiming to ‘attract and grow commercial activities in the space sector keeping us on the cutting edge’.
According to Tom James, a partner at energy consultant Navitas Resources, Middle Eastern countries with an oil-based economy might particularly profit from space mining. Water, he says, is the oil of space; ‘Middle East investment in space is growing as it works to shift from an oil-based to a knowledge-based economy’. Though not pursuing the subject as intensely as their neighbors, Saudi Arabia, in a similar fashion to Luxembourg and the UAE, aims to pump $2.1 billion into its space program by 2030 by means of attracting foreign investments as part of its Vision 2030 economic diversification efforts to become less dependent on oil. Japan, India, Russia, and China have also expressed interest in space mining.
But while more countries venturing to space is undoubtedly a good thing, this motivation of unthinkable riches does not bode well. Remember what happened here on Earth when oil was all the rage? And while there are international laws prescribed by the UN demanding that space be used for peaceful purposes only, these are vague, outdated, and therefore easy to manipulate. The main one — the Outer Space Treaty — was implemented in 1967, with several smaller treaties to follow. Who back then could have foreseen the state of the space industry today?
The US, Luxembourg, and UAE are already tweaking the rules pertaining to ownership of space; the 1967 treaty states that a nation may not claim sovereignty or ownership over a body, but already that is being thrown into question by the countries insisting that fragments of it can. In addition, all countries listed above — apart from Saudi Arabia — are not party to the 1979 Moon Treaty, which, along with banning the use of military force on the moon or other bodies, lays down the law in terms of space mining.
While such legal matters are strictly theoretical for the moment, they may soon become a real concern; it’s a safe bet that technological developments and governmental support will see mining ventures ramping up soon. In fact, the first commercial undertakings have already begun; California-based startup Astroforge, for example, aims to launch its two maiden missions in 2023.
Such enterprises will also lead to invaluable scientific breakthroughs; asteroids, for example, can tell us about the infant stages of the solar system, and self-sustaining colonies could pave the way for humanity’s permanent presence in space, both in the solar system and beyond. It’s no secret that science isn’t always the only incentive for space actors, and space exploration might often be linked to political or financial motives. Fact is, space is an industry, and a promising one at that. But at least it means we’re going — for better or for worse.
Originally published at https://notrocketscience.substack.com on February 26, 2023.
