The earliest mention of asteroid mining may be in a story from 1898 entitled “Edisons Conquest of Mars,” by Garrett Serviss. In that story, Martians attack Earth, eliminating tens of thousands and damaging New York City. Earth sends an armada and strikes back to Mars. While travelling, the armada discovers an asteroid that the Martians are mining. The asteroid is a rubble pile of gold nuggets.
A discussion breaks out among the crew.
” Phew! Will not we be abundant?” exclaimed a voice.
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They determined the worth of asteroids and started establishing robotic explorers to operate on asteroids. One company called the Asteroid Mining Corporation worked with a Japanese University to establish the Space Capable Asteroid Robotic Explorers (SCAR-E).
Asteroid tasting is just in its infancy, so asteroid mining is hardly past conception. The readily available mass in the MAB and the MC (Mars Crosser) asteroid populations dwarfs that of the NEO asteroids. The Asteroid Psyche is an m-type asteroid, indicating it includes greater proportions of metals like iron and nickel than other classes of asteroids.
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” How are we going to dig it and get it back to earth?” asked another.
” Carry it in your pockets,” said one.
” No need of staking claims here,” remarked another. “There suffices for everyone.”
Their conversation was a prescient tip of things to come.
The idea to mine asteroids bred in the background up until more contemporary times, when the realities of the space-faring age brought the idea into focus.
Beginning in the 2000s, asteroid mining– or at least its potential– gained momentum. People began to wonder about mining asteroids.
Japans Hayabusa brought a sample of asteroid Itokawa back to Earth in 2010. Rich people formed companies with the intent to mine asteroids. In 2015, the United States Congress passed the Space Act that gave US companies the right to mine asteroids and other bodies in area, though it stopped short of declaring sovereignty over any bodies in area.
Business popped up and discussed mining asteroids. They computed the value of asteroids and began developing robotic explorers to run on asteroids. One business called the Asteroid Mining Corporation worked with a Japanese University to develop the Space Capable Asteroid Robotic Explorers (SCAR-E).
An illustration of SCAR-E, the Space Capable Asteroid Robotic Explorers being established by AMC and Tohoku University. Image Credit: AMC/Tohoku University.
The initial fervour of the past couple of years has actually died down, but the idea is still there. And as our understanding of asteroids grows and our space-flight capabilities advance, the idea of asteroid mining will never ever disappear.
There are a number of factors why asteroid mining is preferable. And mining on Earth carries an environmental concern that mining on dead asteroids doesnt.
One day asteroid mining might be possible, lucrative, or even required. Even tasting asteroids is challenging.
Artist principle of NASAs OSIRIS-REx spacecraft as it readies itself to touch the surface area of asteroid Bennu. Asteroid sampling is only in its infancy, so asteroid mining is barely past conception. Credits: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona
How can asteroid mining be drawn out of the realm of science fiction and into truth?
In a new paper, a trio of researchers recommend that some of the obstacles could be conquered by utilizing Mars orbit as a base of operations.
The paper is “Phobos and Mars orbit as a base for asteroid expedition and mining.” The lead author is Anthony Taylor from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The paper is published in the journal Planetary and Space Science.
NEO asteroids are not the target. At some point in our asteroid-mining, space-faring future, well want to develop the asteroids in the primary belt in between Mars and Jupiter. One estimation states theres $100 billion dollars in mineral wealth for every person on Earth in the main asteroid belt.
This poster shows 42 of the biggest objects in the asteroid belt, situated in between Mars and Jupiter (orbits not to scale). The images in the outermost circle of this infographic were caught with the Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet REsearch (SPHERE) instrument on ESOs Very Large Telescope. The asteroid sample features 39 things bigger than 100 kilometres in size, including 20 larger than 200 kilometres. The poster highlights a few of the things, including Ceres (the largest asteroid in the belt), Urania (the smallest one imaged), Kalliope (the densest imaged) and Lutetia, which was checked out by the European Space Agencys Rosetta objective. Image Credit: ESO
The main barrier, according to the paper, is the energy required to reach the main belt and rendezvous with asteroids. An option is to use Mars orbit as a base from which to carry out MBA mining, research study, and prospecting.”
Even the easiest-to-reach MBA is hard to reach from Low Earth Orbit (LEO) because of the delta-v. The Near-Earth Asteroids are a lot easier to reach in comparison. It requires “… a minimum delta-v ~ 7 km s-1 to rendezvous from low Earth orbit (LEO) with the most convenient to reach MBA, compared with ~ 4 km s-1 needed for the simplest to reach near-Earth asteroids (NEOs) from low Earth orbit.”
If you start from Mars orbit, it follows that reaching MBAs is much easier. The delta-v will be far lower. The difference in between ~ 7 km s-1 and ~ 4 km s-1 may not sound like much, but the fuel requirements scale significantly with delta-v.
The group composed some code that allows them to discover the delta-v required to reach and rendezvous with any asteroid in the primary belt from either Earth or Mars orbit. For Mars, they use Phobos orbit, which has to do with 9,000 km (5,600 miles) above the world, and for Earth they utilized LEO. “We used PARC (Python Asteroid Rendezvous Code) to examine whether Phobos-like orbits around Mars at altitudes of ~ 9000 km are more helpful and energetically beneficial locations from which to dispatch objectives to MBAs.”
The brief answer is “Yes they are.”
This figure from the paper compares the delta-v needed to reach asteroids from LEO (leading) to the delta-v needed to reach asteroids from Mars Phobos Orbit (bottom.) Image Credit: Taylor et al. 2022.
The available mass in the MAB and the MC (Mars Crosser) asteroid populations dwarfs that of the NEO asteroids. In terms of large-scale delta-v needed to reach more resources, the Phobos Mars Orbit concept wins once again. “Most understood MCs + mbas are bigger than the largest NEO, (1036) Ganymed, at ~ 50 km size. The accessible mass of MBAs + MCs increases more quickly than a comparable number of NEOs at a given delta-v requirement.”
This figure from the study reveals the circulation of accessible asteroid mass in MBAs + MCsand NEOs from LEO and PMO. Image Credit: Taylor et al. 2022.
In the figure above, the large asteroids Ceres, Pallas, and Vesta skew the outcomes a little. They need a big delta-v to reach, though its still lower from PMO than from LEO. “But operationally it is the low delta-v tails that are of particular interest,” the authors write.
The authors point out that for a specific delta-v, more MAB material is available from PMO. Over 99.9% of that product is in MABs and MCs, while the unimportant rest is in LEOs. On the other hand, “From LEO, just ~ 3 x 106 tonnes of product are available within?
The authors acknowledge that, and stress that their research study is focused on reaching asteroid resources from an already established base. There are all kinds of other variables depending on the mass of the devices sent out to asteroids, where and how itll be processed, what will be done with the waste, and where the drawn out resources will go.
The Asteroid Psyche is an m-type asteroid, suggesting it contains higher proportions of metals like iron and nickel than other classes of asteroids. Information from that mission will tell us more about the mineral worth of asteroids in the MAB.
One team of researchers cant answer all these concerns. Their paper merely reveals how it takes fewer resources to reach the bulk of the Solar Systems asteroidal product from MPO than it does from LEO. Whether asteroid mining ever makes sense depends upon an entire lot of factors.
Thats where the Phobos delta-v charge comes in. Its the rate a spacecraft pays to steer in and out of orbit around Mars. The planets gravity well extracts its own price.
” Whether the Phobos delta-v penalty is financially disadvantageous depends upon the masses to be moved, both of raw and beneficiated (refined) ore, and of mining and processing equipment,” the authors discuss. “If the beneficiating equipment is huge then the streamlined raw material gathering spacecraft that will undertake the Phobos to asteroid journey might be of significantly lower mass.”
Maybe the structural materials in the asteroids, like iron, would be utilized to make other centers in the MAB or in Mars orbit. “We discover that there is a far bigger population of known asteroids accessible to current innovation from Phobos orbit than from low Earth orbit, by an aspect of 300 in number and a factor 109 in mass for a delta-v of 4 km s-1,” the paper concludes.
Phobos itself might play an advantageous role, according to the authors.
” Phobos is a convenient site for emplacing huge ore-refining equipment. Phobos has residential or commercial properties that help in extracting ore from raw asteroid product, as it provides some gravity, an inertial platform, and radiation shielding. Phobos may then function as an useful forward running base for the exploration and mining of the Main Belt.”
The ESAs Mars Express Orbiter recorded this picture of the Martian moon Phobos. The authors of a brand-new study recommend Phobos could be a base of operations for mining in the asteroid belt. Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum).
If this concept ever comes to fulfillment, then its likely that Mars itself will be a part of it. “The existence oflarge-scale operations in Mars orbit may also cause regular access to Mars surface area,” they write.
The rest is left to our creativities. Would human beings lead the mining operation? If so, then Mars might function as a type of lifeboat in case of problems. Evacuating a damaged mining spacecraft and landing on Mars, where we can extract oxygen, fuel, and water, and store food and other materials, appears like a natural emergency situation backup strategy.
Or possibly there d be extremely little need for flesh and blood humans. Perhaps robotics could do the majority of the work. Robotic technology is growing in leaps and bounds and theres no factor to believe it will not keep advancing.
Asteroid mining is really in-situ resource utilization writ large. The resources in the MAB will play a function if humanity is ever going to broaden out into the Solar System. Just time will expose precisely what that function is.
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