Scarcity has been a defining feature of human existence, driving economies by making goods in limited supply more expensive than those that are abundantly available.

But scarcity has been ingrained in our way of doing business because we have been taught to narrowly view resources as being entirely earthbound.

But all of that could soon change…

Today, groups of entrepreneurs are beginning to think that asteroid mining and space mining could help eliminate the scarcity of some essential resources and make some people insanely wealthy at the same time.

But is this just a pipe dream? Neil deGrasse Tyson doesn’t seem to think so…

However, it will be complicated nonetheless.

Yet, despite the myriad of complexities surrounding this new form of resource extraction, a handful of private companies — including Deep Space Industries, Kepler Energy & Space Engineering, Planetary Resources, and others — have started constructing plans to get into the space- and asteroid-mining game.

Regardless of who gets their hands on an asteroid first, the methods used to get to that point will likely be similar…

Space Mining 101

The celestial idea of exploiting asteroids for their natural resources is older than the U.S. space program — some being rich with organic material and containing water; others being heavy with precious metals.

An ideal target would be an asteroid approximately 4–5 km. wide. An asteroid of this size could easily contain about 500,000 tonnes of precious metals.

Scientists have even said that we could get potentially 300 years’ worth of platinum from one asteroid, which would completely change the platinum market and other precious metals markets.

Two privately held U.S. companies, Planetary Resources and Deep Space Industries, are spearheading the private sector push to mine asteroids.

But these companies aren’t pushing hard for gold or other precious metals. Instead, they have their sights locked on water, hydrogen, and oxygen.

And experts say that full implementation of space-mining technologies is less than two decades away.

But in order to successfully start asteroid mining, a few obstacles must be overcome first.

One of them is our insufficient knowledge about particular asteroids. Although our understanding of asteroids as a whole is advanced enough, learning insights about the nature of various types of near-Earth objects could be the key to success.

Another obstacle is that mining techniques will have to be tailored to each specific type of asteroid. Unfortunately, in this endeavor, a one-size-fits-all approach just won’t work.

Therefore, mining companies will need to know what are the best asteroids to mine and where they are. It will also be necessary to know as much as possible about the characteristics of these objects.

This gap in asteroid-mining technology will have to be addressed in order to bring it to reality…

WHY?

It definitely seems like space mining is something to be reserved for our favorite sci-fi movies, leaving a lot of people asking Why?

Well, to put it bluntly, it holds a very real possibility of making certain companies stinking rich.

In order for space mining to become a successful commercial endeavor, mining firms will have to begin looking for elements that are extremely scarce here on Earth.

These include gold, silver, platinum, copper, indium, lead, palladium, and so on…

Beyond valuable elements, asteroids could be mined for water to help hydrate other off-world ventures like, say, a moon colony or a Mars colony and to replenish our depleted or polluted reserves here on Earth.

Another valuable resource that could potentially be mined from space is helium-3 — an isotope that could become a reliable fuel source for nuclear fusion.

Although our planet has scant traces of helium-3, our moon has an abundance of it.

So, if we ever get our fusion reactors online, having a massive store of efficient fuel on our planetary doorstep could enable us in powering our planet for generations.

While this isn’t an exhaustive list of what could be obtained from space, the value of a single sizeable asteroid can’t be overstated.

We’re talking about quintillions of dollars, with a NASA estimate putting the entire asteroid belt in the range of $700 quintillion.

In other words, if this wealth were distributed equally to every living person on the planet today, each one of us would have over $100 billion.

Asteroid Blockchain

With all this wealth waiting to be plucked from the skies, important questions arise: who would own these asteroids, and how would anyone be able to place claims on them?

Blockchain might be the answer to that.

Hong Kong-based Asteroid, Ltd. has launched one of the most anticipated ICOs of this year in its mission to establish a blockchain-based mechanism for overseeing the rights to more than half a million asteroids already identified within Earth’s celestial orbit.

Using a public-distributed ledger made possible by blockchain technology, Asteroid, Ltd. will act as a formal registry platform where individuals, companies, and nation states can stake their rights to claim any of the asteroids spotted and tracked since 1980.

But according to The Outer Space Treaty ratified by the UN in 1967, it was declared that outer space would be for all humankind and that no nation-state or sovereignty may claim it as their own.

So, in other words, asteroids belong to everyone. But that still could cause conflicts to arise, and a publicly distributed ledger just might be the solution to any future problems.

Asteroid, Ltd. proposes a unique implementation of its proprietary mechanism called BlockClaim that would be to space what domains are to the internet.

It will be deployed worldwide to record mining claims in terrestrial and non-terrestrial space environments, using smart contracts based on the Ethereum protocol to automate mining claims defined by datasets.

This decentralized solution will ensure true democratization of space, allowing for any individual, corporation, or nation-state to make claims easily and efficiently.

The immutability and security of each BlockClaim ensure that they are stored permanently on the blockchain.

Each BlockClaim will be secured via a token called ASTR (or ASTRCOIN) within the Ethereum platform.

This will ensure significant usage of the token currency and, along with consistent registrations, will give liquidity and growth in the value of the currency.

The Bottom Line

Among the many startups, the race to start mining asteroids is well underway.

Their pioneering world could easily transform our economy and, maybe even one day, our ability to explore the entire universe.

That’s all for now.

Until next time,

John Peterson
Pro Trader Today