Frontiers in Mining, Part 3: Space, the Final Frontier

The resources industry is an integral part of society. Civilization has needed minerals since prehistoric times, and humanity has been refining the extractive industries ever since.

But there are some frontiers where the mining industry hasn’t quite landed, either because of harsh conditions, lack of technology or — importantly — need for development.

One such area happens to be the final frontier: space. The first person in space was Yuri Gagarin in 1961, and Neil Armstrong didn’t set foot on the moon until 1969.

Much has happened since then — near-Earth space is used for research and development via satellites, and exploration, though limited, is taking place with soil samples on landers and flybys from deep-space probes — but there isn’t much in the way of infrastructure above our heads.

This is part three of a series on frontiers in mining, where the Investing News Network (INN) looks at the far reaches of mining around the world and beyond.

Space mining

The challenge: Lack of industry and technology and abundance of vacuum.

Mining in space is common enough in popular culture, including science fiction books, movies, television and games. It’s also a popular subject in mainstream media, getting plenty of oxygen as a general interest talking point every now and then.

Most recently, NASA was reported to be looking into the metallic composition of Psyche 16, a comet between Mars and Jupiter that apparently has enough gold to make every person on Earth a billionaire — and then there’s 55 Cancri e, a massive planet that could be largely made of diamond.

So, there’s lots of minerals and wealth out there, but we’re stuck here on little old Earth, and should set our goals accordingly.

For now, research into mining in space is almost entirely academic: Humans lack the financial incentive, the technology and the basic need to conduct mining in space for any commodity.

But that could be on the verge of changing, according to Jeff Plate of Watts, Griffis and McOuat (WGM), a Toronto-based mining consultancy.

In August, Plate and WGM released a “Conceptual Economic Study for Lunar Water Mining,” which, as its name suggests, explores the financial side of possibly mining water on the moon.

Speaking with INN, Plate said that right now, mining in space is at a comparable place in terms of development to the internet in 1994.

“If we look at any mining rush, in any new area that’s been exploited for mineral resources on the planet, usually the first people in make all the money and there’d be extraordinary profits. Then once it refines, everyone piles in, and then you get a mining boom and then a bust and then it normalizes. I suspect you’ll see a similar development cycle within lunar mining, but it’s very early days stuff.”

So what’s it early days for? Well, water is used by small satellites (of which there are many) as a propellant to keep them in orbit or out of the way of other items in orbit.

Additionally, commercial rocketry has taken off — pardon the pun — with companies like SpaceX, Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin putting space within reach.

“They’ve driven down launch costs to about a 10th of what they once were, and they’re continuing to go down,” said Plate.

Gavin Mudd, associate professor of environmental engineering at RMIT University in Melbourne, talked about space mining as well. Going back to recent media coverage of the trillion dollar gold comet and prior coverage of the diamond planet, Mudd said that a common misconception about space mining is that materials mined off Earth will be brought back down the gravity well.

“That’s certainly not what the intention is,” said Mudd, who explained that mining in space is for materials to be used in space — exactly like Plate’s water study, though Mudd added that a lot of the processes used to mine metallic materials on Earth aren’t capable of being used off-world.

“All of our technologies for metals, all of them revolve around oxygen. So the way we process is through pyrometallurgy, (and) a lot of the ways we go about mining and refining metals work in our atmosphere, but not in space.”

Another challenge is that industries that could link together to make space mining work tend to be siloed from each other, according to Plate.

Plate is optimistic about the future of the industry in space, saying that there are agencies willing to sign contracts with companies today for water in space — and water may be the spark that gets the industry going, even if we lack the technology in 2019.

Click here to read parts one and two of INN’s series on frontiers in mining.

Don’t forget to follow us @INN_Resource for real-time news updates.

Securities Disclosure: I, Scott Tibballs, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.

Editorial Disclosure: The Investing News Network does not guarantee the accuracy or thoroughness of the information reported in the interviews it conducts. The opinions expressed in these interviews do not reflect the opinions of the Investing News Network and do not constitute investment advice. All readers are encouraged to perform their own due diligence.