On Wednesday, the government of Luxembourg announced that the nation has plans to become a top player in the industry of asteroid mining. The tiny European country will work on legal and regulatory frameworks to govern extraction of minerals from objects in space and will be funding research of such activities.
Luxembourg's ministry of the economy declared in a statement that these measures are meant to promote the nation as an European hub in the exploration of space resources. Luxembourg has previously made efforts to promote its international high-tech profile and it is already home to a satellite operator called SES.
According to the website NPR, exploiting the natural resources of asteroids has long been a dream of futurists, inventors and investors and it is only a matter of time before the idea will become reality. Eric Anderson, co-founder of Planetary Resources, explained that there are many asteroids rich in natural gas, iron and nickel.
There are technical challenges involved in asteroid-mining activities. NASA and private companies are still working on their plans for collecting asteroid sampling probes.
Luxembourg comes to join the space race. In order to help asteroid mining become a practical possibility, the tiny European country has plans to potentially invest in individual companies as well as to fund research and development using money dedicated to the national space budget.
There is still a legal issue that stays in the way of the space race for asteroid mining. The nearly 50-years old Outer Space Treaty states that asteroids do not belong to any individual nation. Companies that plan to extract resources from asteroids are facing a legal question, according to Joanne Gabrynowicz, director at the International Institute of Space Law.
Luxembourg plans a formal legal framework of its own in order to address this issue. Luxemburg's ministry of the economy explains that the country aims to offer new horizons in space exploration that could stimulate economic growth. Not only the profits could be significant, but mining on asteroids doesn't damage the environment on Earth.
