In March, Goldman Sachs announced to investors that a single asteroid containing $25 billion to $50 billion of platinum could be mined by a spacecraft costing only $2.6 billion.
In April, NASA selected Trans Astronautica Corp., for $3.25 million in technology study grants. Among TransAstra’s NASA-approved projects: an asteroid-hunting telescope whose stated mission is “to start a gold rush in space & search for other precious metals.”
Goldman Sachs has claimed mining asteroids for precious metals is a “realistic” goal.
It is believed an asteroid the size of a football field could be worth up to $30 billion.
However, bringing that much platinum back to Earth is likely to crash the precious metal market - and probably the rest of the economy with it.
Earlier this year, NASA said it was planning a mission to an asteroid worth $10,000 quadrillion, according to Lindy Elkins-Tanton, lead scientist on the mission.
It is called 16 Psyche and is a massive hunk of the iron and nickel with some precious metals mixed in.
The mysterious "metal world" was formed during the turbulent birth of our solar system.
CHINA plans to build a base on an asteroid and begin mining billions or even trillions of dollars worth of precious metals.
A top Chinese scientist revealed plans to land an unmanned craft on a space rock, potentially putting Beijing’s asteroid miners in direct competition with American space prospectors.
The asteroid will then be mined or even used to piggyback probes into deep space.
Ye Peijian, a deep-space exploration expert at the China Academy of Space Technology, told an asteroid exploration forum that 900 space rocks zoom past Earth every year.
Many of these priceless asteroids contain vast amounts of metals such as platinum, iridium or rhodium.
“In the near future, we will study ways to send robots or astronauts to mine suitable asteroids and transport the resources back to Earth,” he said.
“In the long term, we will consider using resources from asteroids to build facilities in space or to provide materials to support interstellar travel.”
The asteroids could also be used on deep space missions and serve as “bases for interstellar exploration”.
The Chinese scientist suggested an unmanned probe could hitch a ride on the asteroid and then travel off into deep space, which would drastically cut down on the amount of fuel needed to power the probe.
Topic: Gold Rush in Space (Read 2894 times)
