On February 15th the world got a wakeup call from something we normally see as cold and dead: outer space. A small meteor, estimated 50 feet wide (weight is unknown but in the range of several thousand pounds) exploded with a 300 kiloton yield over Chelyabinsk, Russia and injured 1,200 people from glass debris (huffingtonpost.com).
This happened under the watchful eye of every radar and like detection system, and the most disturbing thing is that even if someone had detected the space-rock, there is nothing we could have done to stop it. There is no weapon system in existence that can shoot down or capture an object traveling at 11 miles per second. This impact event could have been easily been a lot worse in all sorts of ways, so the $33 million in damages is thankfully minimal; but it still nonetheless this event demonstrates how underdeveloped our space capabilities are.
It is time to build up our interplanetary infrastructure and we can utilize the very thing plunged into our atmosphere to power a new industrial age.
There are 10,000 known Near Earth Objects (NEO), which are asteroids that fly through the inner solar system (nothing past mars counts), and there could be upwards of 500 thousand more hurtling past our door step (nasa.gov).
As we all know, a fairly large asteroid hit Earth and killed all the dinosaurs; but had they developed a space program, the evolution of mammals would have turned out very differently. Instead of waiting around for one of planet killers to hit us, we go to them and create a solar empire with their materials.
Asteroid mining is a new industry that wants to do exactly that: capture, mine, and expand. The two companies that are on the forefront of asteroid mining are Planetary Resources (PR) and Deep Space Industries (DSI), and they plan to start launching space craft within the next five years. This first generation Arkyd (PR) and Firefly (DSI) will be small-robotic-swarms of observation and retrieval probes that could bring back small asteroids like the size of the one that hit Russia back to Earth.
Hauling space rocks around does not seem all that attractive, until you realize that they are loaded with metals that are found nowhere on Earth (aside from meteor impact site) such as Palladium, Iridium and Platinum which are used in advanced electrons and medical equipment.
They also contain water (as ice), iron and everything else needed to create rocket fuel and construction material. A single small asteroid has the potential to hold tens of billions of dollars worth of minerals in something no bigger than a football field, and that is just the crumbs in the cornucopia of our solar system.
The financial reasons for starting asteroid mining could not be more impressive, but the investors can sit there salivating all they want, but at they need creative college educated people to make the technology real. While not everyone wants to build rockets and space probes, everyone will want the benefits of what those crafts will bring back.
With the resources that will be brought back, we can fight illness with better tools, build more efficient green technology and reduce costs of all modern goods. To put the effect this influx of rare material will have, consider aluminum one of the most abundant metals on Earth but no one could give out a way to isolate it from other impurities, which made it more valuable than gold. After a break through in the early 1800s, aluminum became one of the cheapest and widely used metals and helped spark the Industrial Revolution (slate.com).
Once the initial investments have paid off, asteroid miners will begin to construct fuel depots and supply stations between Earth, the moon, and mars. The cost of space travel has traditionally laid in the cost of fuel, but with plentiful fuel awaiting ships at regular points the ships save millions; thus making space more accessible to the public and future businesses. Going back to the Mars One mission from a few issues ago, the colonists might be able to journy home at somepoint because they replenish their fuel supplies, which is the reason why they cannot make return trip. More people would probably be willing to become space colonists, if they have the option of coming home to Earth. Sure there will be a group who never look back and journey further out, but the more bodies we have in space the better. The politicians and public need to stop treating the space industry as a special interest group and begin to build our solar infrastructure. We need to look up at the sky and respect it because it harbors our fate in destruction or ascension.
Let us make it a goal that in the next 65 million years, the most intelligent life form will look down at the reconstructed skeleton of Homo sapiens and not say, “They had the foresight to see their own doom, but did nothing to stop it.”
Grant Vargas
Viewpoints Editor