Yahoo Finance Forget Mars — This Unseen Frontier Is Worth Quintillions Of Dollars (18 Zeroes)
On Oct. 13, 2023, SpaceX Falcon Heavy launched the Psyche spacecraft from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This mission is a significant step toward a new frontier in space exploration: the vast and resource-rich asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
The Psyche mission is about scientific discovery, but it also could usher in a new economic era through asteroid mining because scientists believe the target’s core is made up of exposed metallic iron, nickel, and gold.
Per Lindy Elkins-Tanton, the lead scientist on the NASA mission and the director of Arizona State University's School of Earth and Space Exploration, Psyche could be worth more than the global economy at $10 quintillion ($10,000,000,000,000,000,000).
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However, asteroid mining is resource-heavy and involves identifying, capturing, and extracting these valuable resources from the asteroid.
The Asteroid Belt: An Untapped Wealth
The asteroid belt contains an incredible amount of untapped resources. Out of at least 1,351,400 known asteroids, around 35,000 are near-Earth and range in size from several hundred miles to just a few feet across.
The asteroid Davida, about 200 miles wide, is estimated to have resources worth around $27 quintillion. Davida comprises nickel, iron, cobalt, nitrogen, ammonia, and hydrogen, making it the most valuable known asteroid.
Another noteworthy asteroid, Diotima, with a diameter of 130 miles, is speculated to be worth $7.09 quintillion.
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Investment and Legal Framework
When it comes to investment and legal framework, a tiny European country, Luxembourg has been a pioneer in supporting space mining initiatives. In June 2016, the country set aside €200 million ($223 million) to fund these projects and introduced a law to give clear legal guidelines for commercial asteroid mining. Likewise, the United States passed a law in November 2015 to support space mining efforts.
Along with government support, private investment has surged as well. Billionaires like Google co-founder Larry Page have put money into space projects. However, his company, Planetary Resources, didn’t make it and was bought by ConsenSys, a blockchain software company, in 2018.
That didn’t stop a new wave of companies from emerging in recent years. In 2021, Los Angeles-based Inversion secured $10 million in funding to develop an affordable way to return materials from space. In May 2022, AstroForge raised $13 million in seed funding to pursue its goal of mining asteroids. But instead of bringing whole asteroids back to Earth, AstroForge plans to break them up, refine the materials in space, and return only the valuable elements.
The Expanding Global Space Economy
Statista reveals that investment in space ventures has grown significantly — from $1.11 billion between 2000 and 2005 to $10.2 billion between 2012 and 2017.
The economic potential of space exploration goes beyond just mining asteroids. McKinsey predicts that the global space economy will grow from $630 billion in 2023 to $1.8 trillion by 2035, even after considering inflation. This growth includes satellites, launchers, and services like broadcast TV or GPS, but also broader applications where space technology helps businesses in many industries make money.
The Future Of Space Mining
With the asteroid belt’s wealth waiting to be tapped, investing in this new frontier is expected to be incredibly worthwhile. The expansion of the global space economy suggests a future where space exploration advances science but also significantly boosts economic growth.
To quote the renowned astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, "The first trillionaire there'll ever be is the person who mines asteroids for their natural resources."
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