Humans have big plans for mining in space – but there are many things holding us back

By Michael Dello-Iacovo, Casual academic, UNSW Sydney
Serkan Saydam, Off Earth Mining, Future Mining, Mining Systems, UNSW Sydney

Like Earth, planetary bodies such as the Moon, Mars, asteroids and comets contain substantial deposits of valuable resources. This has caught the attention of both researchers and industry, with hopes of one day mining them to support a space economy.

But setting up any kind of off-Earth mining industry will be no small feat. Let’s look at what we’re up against.

In-situ resource utilisation

When you think of off-Earth mining, you might imagine extracting materials from various bodies in space and bringing them back to Earth. But this is unlikely to be the first…

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