Companies and organizations[edit]
Several organizations have said they are working on asteroid mining, including:
Organisation Type
Planetoid Mines Company Private company
NEO Resource Atlas (NEORA) Private company
Deep Space Industries Private company
Planetary Resources Private company
Moon Express Private company
Kleos Space Private company
TransAstra Private company
Aten Engineering Private company
OffWorld Private company
Asteroid Mining Corporation Ltd. UK
[52] Private company
Potential targets[edit]
According to the Asterank database, the following asteroids are considered the best targets for mining if maximum cost-effectiveness is to be achieved (last updated December 2018):
[53]
Asteroid Est. Value (US$billion) Est. Profit (US$billion) Δv (km/s) Composition
Ryugu 83 30 4.663 Nickel, iron, cobalt, water, nitrogen, hydrogen, ammonia
1989 ML 14 4 4.889 Nickel, iron, cobalt
Nereus 5 1 4.987 Nickel, iron, cobalt
Bennu 0.7 0.2 5.096 Iron, hydrogen, ammonia, nitrogen
Didymos 62 16 5.162 Nickel, iron, cobalt
2011 UW158 7 2 5.189 Platinum, nickel, iron, cobalt
Anteros 5,570 1,250 5.440 Magnesium silicate, aluminum, iron silicate
2001 CC21 147 30 5.636 Magnesium silicate, aluminum, iron silicate
1992 TC 84 17 5.648 Nickel, iron, cobalt
2001 SG10 3 0.5 5.880 Nickel, iron, cobalt
Economics[edit]
Currently, the quality of the
ore and the consequent cost and mass of equipment required to extract it are unknown and can only be speculated. Some economic analyses indicate that the cost of returning asteroidal materials to Earth far outweighs their market value, and that asteroid mining will not attract private investment at current commodity prices and space transportation costs.
[54][55] Other studies suggest large profit by using
solar power.
[56][57] Potential markets for materials can be identified and profit generated if extraction cost is brought down. For example, the delivery of multiple
tonnes of water to
low Earth orbit for rocket fuel preparation for
space tourism could generate a significant profit if space tourism itself proves profitable.
[58]
In 1997 it was speculated that a relatively small metallic asteroid with a diameter of 1.6 km (1 mi) contains more than US$20 trillion worth of industrial and precious metals.
[7][59] A comparatively small
M-type asteroid with a mean diameter of 1 km (0.62 mi) could contain more than two billion metric tons of
iron–
nickel ore,
[60] or two to three times the world production of 2004.
[61] The asteroid
16 Psyche is believed to contain 1.7×1019 kg of nickel–iron, which could supply the world production requirement for several million years. A small portion of the extracted material would also be precious metals.
Not all mined materials from asteroids would be cost-effective, especially for the potential return of economic amounts of material to Earth. For potential return to Earth,
platinum is considered very rare in terrestrial geologic formations and therefore is potentially worth bringing some quantity for terrestrial use. Nickel, on the other hand, is quite abundant and being mined in many terrestrial locations, so the high cost of asteroid mining may not make it economically viable.
[62]
Although
Planetary Resources indicated in 2012 that the platinum from a 30-meter-long (98 ft) asteroid could be worth US$25–50 billion,
[63] an economist remarked any outside source of precious metals could lower prices sufficiently to possibly doom the venture by rapidly increasing the available supply of such metals.
[64]
Development of an infrastructure for altering asteroid orbits could offer a large
return on investment.
[65] Private companies like
Planetoid Mines are developing space "tugs" and utilizing the mission parameters from NASA's
Asteroid Redirect Mission using a gravitational assist maneuver to redirect an asteroid to cislunar orbit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_mining