Asteroid Mining: Is it the Path to Unlimited Resources?

You’re reading this article on a computer that is more advanced than anything humanity could build a century ago.

This progress in technology was created by rare materials that we all take for granted. These rare materials include Terbium, Neodymium, Tantalum, and many more.

These materials are currently acquired by mining industries that cause large amounts of pollution that harm biodiversity, workers, and locals.

But, is this the only way to get rare materials?

Not necessarily. That’s what we’re going to cover in this article. Keep reading.

Why Asteroids Are Valuable

Asteroids are millions of tons of materials. Most asteroids are in the Asteroid and Kuiper belt in our solar system.

Relatively small metallic asteroids contain trillions worth of precious metals such as platinum, gold, and other materials. Many of these asteroids have many more resources than we currently have on our planet - and if we get a hold of one, we could be set for millions of years down the line.

Why Asteroid Mining is Not Yet Possible

As of now, filtering out the precious metals in an asteroid would be more expensive than the actual metal.

Going to space is also very expensive. Going to an asteroid belt would take a very long time - around 32.5 days and a lot of rocket fuel.

So, what are the solutions to this?

Potential Solutions

This cost could be reduced by electric rockets - which would be cheaper. We are already using electric rocket engines for many of our space probes. Although they aren’t powerful enough to go to space, they are powerful enough to maneuver while in space. So, we should be able to eventually use them for asteroid mining.

We have collected samples from asteroids before, so we can use similar mechanisms with asteroid mining.

We would need very advanced systems to mine and filter out precious metals on asteroids, but once we get there, we will be moving towards our first steps of solar system colonization, which may eliminate the need to mine on Earth.

Final Words

Asteroid mining is the idea of achieving precious materials worth trillions, in a clean way.

As of now, we have only collected samples from space, very small amounts. However, as we continue to increase our technology to mine asteroids, we may have the opportunity to eliminate the need to mine on Earth.

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