Space Mining’s Big Test May Not Be on an Asteroid at All

This perspective paper examines whether asteroids could become future sources of rare earth elements, platinum group metals, and other strategic materials, while positioning the Moon as a nearer-term testbed for in-situ resource utilization technologies. The authors conclude that lunar processing is considerably more technologically mature than asteroid mining, which remains largely conceptual and will require major advances in autonomous processing, transport, governance, sustainability assessment, and techno-economic analysis. Theoretical valuations place billions of dollars of resources inside some asteroids, but turning those distant materials into usable supplies will require solving engineering challenges that begin much closer to Earth. Paper: Asteroid and Lunar Space... [6875 chars]