Asteroid Mining Plan Revealed
Source: Information Week
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Planetary Resources' plan for mining asteroids comes in three steps. First, the company plans to identify all near-earth asteroids, what they are made of, and how to reach them. Then the company will build the spacecraft and other capabilities necessary to reach and mine those resources. Finally, the company will begin mining and delivering those resources.
"This company is not about paper studies, about thinking and dreaming about exploring space," Anderson said in the press conference. "There's been plenty of talking. We're about doing."
It's unclear exactly when the actual mining of these asteroids will begin, but within 24 months Planetary Resources plans to release the first of its spacecraft, the Arkyd 101, which will operate in low-earth orbit as a space telescope. "We will use this capability to look out to the asteroids," Planetary Resources president Chris Lewicki said at the press conference.
After the Arkyd 100-series, the company will launch the Arkyd series, which will go beyond the low orbit of the Arkyd 200. Next, the Arkyd 300 series will directly explore asteroids with swarms of a half dozen spacecraft that will collaborate to learn more about the asteroids. Subsequent series of spacecraft will actually do the mining. According to Anderson, the spacecraft will take advantage of the latest in information technology, including cloud computing.
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Read more: http://www.informationweek.com/news/government/policy/232900877
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