In 2024 an asteroid loaded with precious metals psó touching us. The goal is now to hunt the next one with a giant bag
A year ago, astronomers saw how an asteroid entered the orbit of our planet and accompanied us for almost two months. This “mini-luna” baptized as 2024 PT5 was a warning sign for an industry that never ends up detachment: space mining. The passage of the rock full of rare metals lit the fuse of a new race to not let the next one. The new objective of space mining. The idea that asteroids are floating treasures is not new. According to NASA’s calculationsthe metals contained in the asteroid belt could be equivalent to 100 million dollars for each person on Earth. The problem has always been the same: the prohibitive cost of reaching them. But this type of “mini-lunas” like 2024 PT5, that we are able to detect with current technologythe rules of the game change when approaching us, becoming much more affordable objectives. The Plan: Not Atrices, capture. Landing in an asteroid is a logistics nightmare. They turn at high speed, do not have a significant seriousness that maintains an anchored ship and are covered with a powder that would stuck any machinery. Therefore, the new strategy is not to perch on them, but to capture them in full flight. This is where concepts that seem taken from a science fiction film come into play. Companies like the Tethers Unlimited disappeared They worked on satellite designs capable of launching a gigantic network to catch an asteroid and tow it to a stable orbit. The company failed, but its idea prevails: stop the rotation of asteroids to process them. NASA to hunt asteroids. One of the companies that leads this race was founded by a veteran of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of La NASA, Joel Sercel. The plan of Transaster It is a three -phase technological deployment: Detect: its Sutter telescope system has been designed to find small, dark and fast objects, such as asteroids close to the earth that until now went unnoticed. Capture: His proposal is called Capture Bag, and is a kind of giant inflatable bag designed to completely wrap the asteroid. Process: Once trapped, they would use a technology called optical mining. It consists of using concentrated sunlight with a kind of magnifying glass on an industrial scale to heat the asteroid. This allows you to extract water (in the form of ice) and separate precious metals such as platinum, cobalt or nickel. Precious metals … and precious water. Although metals are the fat prize, the most valuable short -term resource is water. As Joel Serce explains In an interview for Caltechwater is the “oil” of the solar system. It can be broken down into hydrogen and oxygen to create rocket fuel. Extract water from an asteroid and store it in orbit would create the first “space gas stations”. Being quantifies it: 100 tons of water extracted from an asteroid the size of a house, enough to fill a pool, they would have an approximate value of 1,000 million dollars in space. Simply because of the cost that would mean throwing so much water from the earth. To move these loads, Transastra is developing a fleet of tugs called worker bee whose engines can use that water as propellant. Waiting for the next mini-luna. The passage of 2024 PT5 was a lost opportunity. “If we had had our systems in operation, we could have gone for it,” he confessed to being. The industry was not ready, but the starting gun has already sounded. The next time a cosmic treasure approaches the earth, there may be giant networks or bags waiting for it. The 21st century gold fever does not look underground, but towards the stars. Image | NASA, JPL In Xataka | The Earth has lost its miniluna, but posed for a photo before leaving (and promised to return soon)
