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Outer Space Legalities: Laws, Treaties & Legal Claims

ramonmercado

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I think this deserves a topic of its own as some of these people were con artists, some were fantasists, some sadly were deranged and some were hoping for go away money. Anyway its a good read.

Space Cases: The Weirdest Legal Claims in Outer Space
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/06/space-cases/
By Adam MannEmail Author June 1, 2012 | 6:30 am | Categories: Space

In January, a Quebec man named Sylvio Langvein walked into a courthouse in Canada and filed a suit declaring himself owner of the planets in our solar system, four of Jupiter’s moons, and the interplanetary space between.

By way of explanation, Langvein said he wanted to collect planets the same way that others collect hockey cards, and also prevent China from establishing outposts above his head.

The judge overseeing the case, Alain Michaud, dismissed it in March, calling Langvein a “quarrelsome litigant” whose paranoid actions were an abuse of the Canadian legal system. (This was Langvein’s 45th lawsuit — including four motions to the Supreme Court of Canada — since 2001).

The case is bizarre, but not unprecedented.

“Every now and then, someone thinks no one has claimed the moon before, and then rushes to claim it,” wrote Virgiliu Pop, a space law researcher at the Romanian Space Agency, in an email to Wired. “Humankind has a short collective memory, so the claimant is able to create some buzz before the story dies out — to be followed by a similar story, years later.”

As we enter an era when people are seriously advocating that the U.S. establish property rights on the moon and scholars debate the legality of mining asteroids, it’s interesting (and relevant) to look back at the people who have tried to assert ownership of the moon, Mars, other planets, and stars throughout history.

In 2006, Pop literally wrote the book on this matter, titled Unreal Estate: The Men Who Sold The Moon, which he describes as “a serious analysis of a trivial subject.” The compendium offers plenty of outrageous stories, and here we look at some of the book’s most spurious and strange space cases.

Inherit the Moon
Alexander the Great is said to have wept when told by his friend, the philosopher Anaxarchus, that there are countless worlds in the universe.

“Do you not think it a matter worthy of lamentation that when there is such a vast multitude of worlds, we have not yet conquered one?” Alexander said.

Great as Alexander’s ambitions were, he never attempted to draw up documents declaring himself owner of anything in the sky. But one of the earliest modern cases where such claims are made comes from King Frederick the Great, who ruled Prussia in the mid-1700s.

The king was said to have sought help from a great healer named Aul Jurgens and, in exchange for the miraculous cures he received, bequeathed the moon to Jurgen’s family until the end of time. This story comes from one of Jurgen’s descendants, Martin, who in 1996 tried to claim lunar ownership through his illustrious ancestor.

The next year, scholars at the Institute for Air and Space Law in the Netherlands denied Jurgen’s claim on the grounds that the donation by a Prussian sovereign who didn’t actually own the moon in the first place wasn’t valid.


Lindsay’s Archapellago
One night in 1936, A. Dean Lindsay looked up at the moon and thought to himself, “Nobody owns it!”

Seeking to rectify this situation, Lindsay marched into the Pittsburgh Notary Public office and presented a document declaring that he owned “[a]ll of the property known as planets, islands-of-space or other matter, henceforth to be known as ‘A.D. Lindsay’s archapellago.’”

Lindsay’s misspelled archipelago included every planet visible from any other planet or mass in space but omitted three bodies: the Earth, moon, and Saturn. The Earth, Lindsay reasoned, belonged to its inhabitants, but he drew up separate documents declaring himself owner of the moon and Saturn. (Why these two bodies in particular needed separate deeds, no one really knows.) He also registered the documents with the Irwin County Court House in Ocilla, Georgia.

Lindsay apparently planned to make a profit with his new properties (he had previously sold his two prior claims – the Pacific and Atlantic oceans) though little else came from the claims. Lindsay died in June of 1969, just a month shy of the Apollo 11 landing.

Celestial Space Nation
James Thomas Mangan was, according to his autobiography, “an internationally famous speaker, a world champion top spinner, and one of the best grass cutters in America.” He was also founder of the Nation of Celestial Space, which he created in Evergreen Park, Illinois in 1949.

The country (known by its nickname, Celestia) laid claim to everything in space. Mangan presented the Charter of Celestia to the Recorder of Deeds and Titles of Cook County, Illinois, an occasion recorded by numerous media, including Life magazine.

Mangan sent letters to 74 nations inviting them to give him official recognition and applied for membership with the UN in 1948. The international organization rejected his application.

Over the years, Mangan needed to defend his nation’s sovereignty over space from several other contestants, including a student from Tennessee who registered the “southern half of outer space” and an inmate in Alcatraz who claimed his grandfather had been charged rent for sunlight by Austrian Emperor Franz Josef.

Mangan also fought with the USSR, protesting that the launch of Sputnik in 1957 was trespassing on his territory, and was angered that the U.S. didn’t ask his permission to send Surveyor cameras to the moon in 1966. But he was also generous with his powers, issuing a license for banking on the moon to the president of Chicago’s Beverly Bank and presenting official moon passports to the Apollo astronauts.

Though Mangan died in 1970, he passed control of Celestia to his son, James, and his daughter, Ruth. His grandchildren currently oversee the nation.

The Head Cheese
On Nov. 22, 1980, Dennis Hope registered the moon. In the “Declaration of Ownership” he filed with the San Francisco County office, he claimed that he would forever be known as “the omnipitant [sic] ruler of the lighted lunar surface,” with “the exalted title of, ‘The Head Cheese.’”

Hope also registered a business, the Lunar Embassy, and sent copies of his declaration to the U.S., USSR, and UN, along with a $55,000 storage and littering bill. Then Hope did what any entrepreneur would: He started selling off his property, acre by acre.

In the first years, the company sold 3,500 properties on the moon. But with better word-of-mouth and the advent of the internet, Lunar Embassy’s business began to boom. Hope now claims to have 3.6 million property owners in 181 countries, including George Lucas, Ron Howard, Carrie Fisher, members of royal families in six countries, two former U.S. presidents, and several astronauts. You can get an acre for the low, low price of about $20!

While Hope’s claim contradicts international space laws, Lunar Embassy is still in operation and is even selling .moon domain names as well as entire moons in the outer solar system.

Moon Certificates
The site MoonCertificate.com doesn’t rely on any silly Earth governments for its right to the moon. Claiming to be the “only lunar land deed site authorized by the true owners of the moon,” the site derives its authority from the Martian Council of Kings.

The site claims Martian “greys” established lunar property rights 7.2 million years ago and later contacted the website’s owner, allowing them to sell off certificates of ownership.

And, in case you’re wondering, you can also buy Uranus.

Martian Yemenites
After NASA’s Pathfinder mission landed on Mars in 1997, the event drew legal ire from a group of Yemenites. According to Arabic news sources, three men — Adam Ismail, Mustafa Khalil, and Abdullah al-Umari — wanted to sue the agency for trespassing.

Filing a lawsuit with the Yemeni Prosecutor General, the trio argued that they inherited the planet from their ancestors 3,000 years prior, according to mythologies of the ancient Sabaean and Himyaritic civilizations.

The trio demanded the immediate suspension of NASA’s Martian operations and an information blackout on data collected about the Martian atmosphere, gravity, and surface. The Prosecutor General dismissed the case, calling the three plaintiffs “abnormal.”

After the claim failed, the three men went on to try and sell Martian property at $2 a square meter, though the effort never went very far.

Asteroid Claim
When the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft touched down on asteroid 433 Eros in 2001, Gregory Nemitz was ready for it. Nemitz claimed the asteroid was under ownership of his company, Orbital Development, which aimed to mine the rocky body.

“As a Near-Earth Asteroid, Eros is a potential resource base for construction materials and propellants,” read the property claim, which Nemitz filed with the Archimedes Institute in 2000. It also stated that a recreational tourist facility would be built in the spaces cleared by mining.

Nemitz sent NASA an invoice for a parking fee, charging a reasonable $20 per Earth century, due within 21 days of landing. Because Orbital Development had no real legal standing, NASA respectfully declined to pay the fee.

NASA and Nemitz went back and forth for several months, with Nemitz claiming that he had legal ownership of Eros because of his property claim while NASA argued the filing had no foundation in law. An angry Nemitz sent a letter to then-Secretary of State Colin Powell with his grievances and, after being told that his claim violated the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, filed a federal court case in Reno, Nevada concerning the “Treaty vs. the Natural, Inherent Rights of Man” to acquire and own property.

When that court case was dismissed, Nemitz filed with other federal courts, and briefly considered whether or not to take case to the Supreme Court. He eventually dropped the plan in 2005.

Horoscope Damage
One of the most recent space cases involves Marina Bayross, a Russian spiritualist and astrologer. When she heard that NASA’s Deep Impact mission was going to fire a data-gathering projectile at comet Tempel 1, Bayross was disturbed and feared “that it could have an impact on all humanity.”

She brought forth a suit in Russia’s Presnensky District Court in Moscow against NASA, seeking 8.7 billion rubles (about $300 million) in compensation for moral damages. Bayross claimed that the mission was “an encroachment upon the ‘holy of holies’ – my system of life and intellectual values, my faith in the significance of each particle of the universe. This barbarous, arbitrary interference in the natural life of cosmos, and disturbance of the natural balance of forces in the universe, is not permissible.”

Indian astrologers in the 1960s had similarly been angry at the Apollo program, saying the moon was too tainted for use in soothsaying after a man walked on it. The Indonesian island of Bali is also said to have lodged a protest with the UN against the U.S. for desecrating a sacred place. Nothing came of these earlier incidents and Bayross’ suit was eventually dismissed by a higher Russian court.

Images: 1) NASA/Wired Science. 2) James T. Mangan. 3) Asteroid 433 Eros. NEAR Project, NLR, JHUAPL, Goddard SVS, NASA.

RELATEDAROUND THE WEBYOU MIGHT LIKERelated Links by Contextly
International Institute of Air & Space Law - Leiden Law School
The Nation of Celestial Space
Near - The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
Orbital Development: Home Page
Deep Impact

Adam is a Wired reporter and freelance journalist. He lives in Oakland, Ca near a lake and enjoys space, physics, and other sciency things.
 
And a more serious take on the issue.

Who owns asteroids or the moon?
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg2 ... -moon.html
04 June 2012 by Paul Marks
Magazine issue 2867.

Plans to mine minerals on celestial bodies could violate many aspects of international space law

SHOULD asteroids rich in precious metals be regarded, in legal terms, like the fish in the sea? That is one approach the United Nations could take as it struggles to come to terms with mining plans announced by Planetary Resources, a start-up company based in Seattle.

In just under two years, Planetary Resources says it will launch the first of a series of space telescopes into low-Earth orbit in a bid to spot nearby asteroids of a size and mineral composition potentially worth mining. When a strong candidate is found, it plans to dispatch a robotic probe to assess the asteroid's precious metal content, with platinum a priority. If that is found, yet-to-be developed robots will be dispatched to mine it. If it is small enough, the asteroid could be brought into an Earth orbit first, to make the process easier.

Planetary Resources's plans seem well advanced and others are not far behind. And it's not just asteroids in these firms' sights. Moon Express, a start-up based in Las Vegas, is planning to prospect the moon for platinum and other metals deposited on its surface by meteorites.

It all sounds mind-bogglingly expensive and complicated, and it is. But those planning the operations have more earthly concerns to deal with, too. Mining asteroids or the moon appears to violate many of the tenets of international space law.

The most important of these is the UN's Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which in rather pompous language states that "the exploration and use of outer space shall be carried out for the benefit of all countries and shall be the province of all mankind".

It also specifically prohibits states from making territorial claims in space. "States cannot claim rights over an asteroid," says Joanne Wheeler, a lawyer at London legal practice CMS Cameron McKenna and a UK government adviser on the UN's Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. "The Outer Space Treaty says the moon and celestial bodies such as asteroids are not subject to national appropriation. Whether that means no one owns the asteroids, or we all do under some common heritage, what's clear here is there is no state sovereignty over them."

What applies to sovereign states probably also applies to private companies. "It is not possible for Planetary Resources to say it owns all of an asteroid even if they are the first there," says Wheeler.

If the ownership of an asteroid is in question, who, then, has legal title to the ores extracted from it and sold back on Earth? Again, it is not clear, though Wheeler points out that there is already a legitimate market for space rocks in the form of meteorites. This probably puts Planetary Resources in the clear.

Eric Anderson, co-founder of Planetary Resources, doesn't see a problem: "Our analysis shows we have an unequivocal right to mine asteroids. Nothing in the Outer Space Treaty prevents that." He doesn't agree that asteroids, especially those in the 50 to 500-metre size range, are "celestial bodies". Meteorites are fallen asteroids, he says, and they are not regarded as celestial bodies.

Some even see the treaty as irrelevant to asteroid mining. "The Outer Space Treaty is a paper tiger with no teeth," says Michael Gold, a lawyer specialising in commercial spaceflight in Washington DC. "It's unenforceable and any state can pull out of it with a year's notice. I expect mining capability will trump the law in any situation."

Whichever interpretation you prefer, it is clear that there is no international regime explicitly governing asteroid mining. "Planetary Resources are in a rather grey zone," says Wheeler. "This is no legal certainty over whether they can do it or not."

She suggests that a future regime could be based on the law of the sea. "The fish in the high seas are not owned by anyone. You can 'mine' the high seas by taking fish out of them and you can sell them," she says. "Similarly, asteroids might not be owned by anyone but you might be able to mine the resources and then sell them on."

Mining the moon is also fraught with legal uncertainties. In principle it is governed by an international treaty informally called the Moon Agreement, which seeks to manage our satellite's natural resources. But the treaty is largely worthless because it has not been ratified by any of the spacefaring nations.

"The Moon Agreement recognises that mining of the moon is about to become feasible," says Wheeler. "But the US, China and Russia are not signatories, so it lacks teeth." The UN is encouraging members to sign, but the concern is that a fait accompli by a mining company could render the treaty moot.

Finally, what if space mining operations go wrong? If miners cause an asteroid that they have nudged nearer to Earth to plummet into the planet, who would be liable? This is covered by another UN treaty, the Space Liability Convention, which makes the nation that launches a spacecraft liable for damages. "This concept worked back when it was a clear-cut case of governments launching objects, but with many entrepreneurs now launching spacecraft it's getting much more difficult to apportion blame," says Wheeler. As a result, the US and Japan are investigating new liability mechanisms, she says.

The chances of Planetary Resources causing impacts are minimal, says Timothy Spahr, director of the asteroid-hunting Minor Planet Center at Harvard University. Orbital mechanics are well understood, he says, making asteroid trajectory calculations simple. "Hitting the Earth is a damn hard thing to do."

Like many astronomers, Spahr has an asteroid named after him. How would he feel about 2975 Spahr being captured and mined? "That's a tough question," he says. "You'd have to ask a lawyer."

Somehow, I don't think they will have an answer.

Paul Marks is New Scientist's senior technology correspondent
 
Sorry if this is OT, but it remind's me of those "You can name a star" gift's that were popular about 10 years ago. I remember reading in a paper at the time that many people had brought them as gifts for their loved one's only to discover that *shock horror* the star isn't actually named after you. You just get a certificate with a piece of text saying this star is now called Kevin, or whatever.

It puts me in mind of something my Mum used to say to us when we were kids: "Don't be a silly human" :)
 
The relevant UN treaties are available (in the English versions) at:

http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/pdf/public ... ACE11E.pdf

Item E is the 1979 "Agreement Governing the Activities of States
on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies."

It states:


Article 11

1. The Moon and its natural resources are the common heritage of mankind,
which finds its expression in the provisions of this Agreement, in particu-
lar in paragraph 5 of this article.

2. The Moon is not subject to national appropriation by any claim of sove-
reignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means.

3. Neither the surface nor the subsurface of the Moon, nor any part thereof
or natural resources in place, shall become property of any State, interna-
tional intergovernmental or non-governmental organization, national orga-
nization or non-governmental entity or of any natural person.
The place-
ment of personnel, space vehicles, equipment, facilities, stations and
installations on or below the surface of the Moon, including structures
connected with its surface or subsurface, shall not create a right of own-
ership over the surface or the subsurface of the Moon or any areas thereof.
The foregoing provisions are without prejudice to the international regime
referred to in paragraph 5 of this article.

These provisions are not limited in scope to the moon alone, because ...

Article 1
1. The provisions of this Agreement relating to the Moon shall also apply to
other celestial bodies within the solar system, other than the Earth
, except
insofar as specific legal norms enter into force with respect to any of these
celestial bodies.

...
 
Space Law - national or international?

The companies vying to turn asteroids into filling stations
By Debbie Siegelbaum, BBC News, Washington

Private companies want to mine asteroids for fuel, and build filling stations in space. A bill now in front of the US Congress would help by allowing them to own what they discover - but it might, if passed, meet stiff international opposition.

Chris Lewicki is trying to get water from a stone. A really big stone thousands of miles from Earth.
The president of space mining firm Planetary Resources used to oversee robotic Mars missions at Nasa, but today he's betting big on asteroids.
The chunks of matter hurtling through the cosmos are rich in valuable minerals, he says, but finding water could be like striking liquid gold.

"We can tell from telescopes that look out from mountaintops here on Earth that certain types of asteroids can be relatively abundant in water and water-bearing minerals," he says.
But why is water, which covers much of our planet, so valuable in space?
According to Lewicki, it currently costs nearly $2bn (£1.2bn) per year to launch enough water - six tons per person - to sustain the six astronauts aboard the International Space Station.

But, in addition to providing drinking water, H20 can also be converted into breathable air, and into fuel - liquid hydrogen and oxygen form the most efficient rocket fuel known to man.
Currently, spacecraft must carry all the fuel they require, adding significant weight and driving up the cost of getting beyond Earth's gravity. Once in space, expensive equipment may be abandoned because it's too costly to take back to Earth.
But, says Lewicki, "Imagine being able to get into space and refuel your spaceship [there]."
Asteroids have little gravity, he adds, so landing on and taking off from them does not require too much energy. Their prevalence and proximity to Earth make them valuable potential way stations for refuelling on longer missions into space.

Michael Lopez-Alegria, former Nasa astronaut and current president of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, says industry is definitely interested in the "very lucrative" idea of space mining, and not just on asteroids.
"There's an amazing amount of frozen water at the polar regions of the moon," Lopez-Alegria adds. "The moon is easier to get to than an asteroid, it's right next door and it's much easier to communicate with a robot or people [there]."
Unfortunately, strict legislation in the form of the 1966 United Nations' Outer Space Treaty already prohibits national appropriation of space resources. Basically, mining the moon is legally off limits.

But, experts say mining asteroids - particularly for resources which could remain in space - falls into a legal grey area unconceived of by legislators four decades ago.
As the commercial space industry grows, with billions of dollars already invested, entrepreneurs argue they should be able to own what they find. The costs are simply too great to risk having their discoveries taken from them by governments or competitors.

Lewicki says the lack of legal certainty over ownership is already giving potential investors pause and hurting his company's growth.
Other private companies aren't the only competition, either. Lewicki says China has launched unmanned exploratory missions to asteroids as well as the moon, and Nasa is working on a manned mission to collect samples from a near-Earth asteroid in the 2020s.

If the US wants its private space industry to jump into the fray, argues Lopez-Alegria, legislators must create a more "predictable environment" in which companies can "enjoy the rights of their extraction or to extract without interference" in space.

Cue the American Space Technology for Exploring Resource Opportunities in Deep Space (ASTEROIDS) Act, introduced by Republican Congressman Bill Posey in July.
The slim five-page document proposes allowing US commercial entities ownership over "any resources obtained in outer space from an asteroid".
Lewicki gave Posey advice on the bill, and though some people say it is overly vague, he argues it provides a broad outline for a new and burgeoning industry.

Democratic Congresswoman Donna Edwards, the ranking member of the US House Subcommittee on Space, disagrees.
In her view, it's perilous to rush into such long-lasting and far-reaching legislation.
"Our job is not to do things, enact legislation, for particular business interests," she says. "Our job is to figure out a plan and a protocol for the United States space program and for the way that we interact internationally."

In a recent Congressional hearing on the matter, space law professor Joanne Gabrynowicz warned the Asteroids Act's potential political impact on international treaties "is likely to be sizeable".
"If made into law, it should be expected that there would be both legal and political challenges to its terms," she added.

Edwards says international partners - including the European Space Agency and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency - as well as China and Russia, need to be involved from the beginning in conversations over space ownership rights.
"We have to [recognise] that we're not the only game in town," she says. "We have an obligation... to figure out what the lay of the land is going to look like and all of us then playing by the same rules."
Ultimately, Edwards adds, "we're not going to be mining asteroids tomorrow, so we have time to figure out what the framework should be".

But, Lewicki says Planetary Resources will be launching its first spacecraft by the beginning of next year and already has plans for several more.
"If Congress finds a way to... bring [space mining] into law, that allows us really to potentially accelerate our efforts and pursue this even more aggressively than we are today," he says.
It's "going to happen much sooner than I think a lot of people realise," Lewicki insists.
"We're not decades away... there's companies ready to do this now."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-29334645

I'm already working on the script for a new blockbuster film, "Lawyers in Space!" :D
 
garrick92 said:
I'm no expert on law, let alone space law, but didn't the British Government annexe the moon under the Outer Space Act (1986)? Or is it an UL? (The legislation itself is real, I just don't know the precise details).

Lunatics.
 
In which case should we be charging the Americans storage rent for all the kit they left up there during the Apollo missions?
 
garrick92 said:
I'm no expert on law, let alone space law, but didn't the British Government annexe the moon under the Outer Space Act (1986)? Or is it an UL? (The legislation itself is real, I just don't know the precise details).

UL. It makes it law that British people/companies need licenses in order to launch objects into space. It was so that the UK could keep consistent with it's obligations under the Outer Space Treaty.
 
New Space Mining Legislation Is 'History in the Making'

Space mining just got a big boost.

The U.S. Congress' passage of a bill that allows American companies to own and sell materials they extract from the moon, asteroids or other celestial bodies should help spur the development of off-Earth mining, representatives of the nascent industry say.

"It sets up a firm foundation for the next phase of our business," said Chris Lewicki, president and chief engineer of Planetary Resources, which plans to mine water and metals from near-Earth asteroids. [Asteroid Mining: Planetary Resources' Plan in Pictures]

"It's a sign to everyone that [exploiting] space resources, and commercial space exploration, is underway, and it's happening now," Lewicki told Space.com. "It's not something that's going to happen in the far future. You are seeing history in the making."

The bill, known as the U.S. Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act(CSLCA), was approved by the Senate on Nov. 10 and by the House of Representatives on Monday (Nov. 16). The CSLCA will now go to the White House, and most experts expect President Barack Obama to sign it.

The bill addresses a number of spaceflight issues. For example, it extends the United States' commitment to the International Space Station through at least 2024, and it gives private companies until 2023 to meet human-spaceflight safety standards, pushing back the original deadline by seven years.

But the space-mining aspect of CSLCA has generated the most headlines. The bill's Title IV reads, in part:

"A United States citizen engaged in commercial recovery of an asteroid resource or a space resource under this chapter shall be entitled to any asteroid resource or space resource obtained, including to possess, own, transport, use, and sell the asteroid resource or space resource obtained in accordance with applicable law, including the international obligations of the United States."


http://www.space.com/31177-space-mi...id=680440378114244609&adbpl=tw&adbpr=15431856
 
Asteroid mining could be space’s new frontier: the problem is doing it legally
Extracting minerals in space will be costly and challenging, but the biggest difficulty may lie in a treaty over who owns the moon
Rob Davies
Saturday 6 February 2016 16.00 GMT

When Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong hoisted the Stars and Stripes on the moon, the act was purely symbolic. Two years earlier, mindful of Cold War animosity, the 1967 Outer Space Treaty (OST) had decreed that outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, “is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty”.
In other words no country, not even the US, could own the moon or any other part of space, regardless of how many flags they erected there. Half a century on, though, the OST could prove the biggest obstacle to one of the most exciting new frontiers of space exploration: asteroid mining.

The reason lawyers could soon be poring over that 48-year-old document is that space mining could become a reality within a couple of decades.

In what is being seen as a major breakthrough for this embryonic technology, the government of Luxembourg has thrown its financial muscle behind plans to extract resources from asteroids, some of which are rich in platinum and other valuable metals. It plans to team up with private companies to help speed the progress of the industry and draw up a regulatory framework for it.

One such firm, Deep Space Industries, wants to send small satellites, called Fireflies, into space from 2017 to prospect for minerals and ice. The satellites would hitch a ride on a rocket, and larger craft would then be used to harvest, transport and store raw materials.

Metals such as nickel and iron, which are plentiful on Earth, could be processed while in orbit and used to build equipment or spacecraft. And it may eventually be possible to extract valuable minerals from asteroids cheaply enough for it to be worth bringing them back to Earth.

Rival Planetary Resources has a slightly different plan, in which telescopes would be used to analyse asteroids before craft were sent to mine them. Its backers include Google co-founder Larry Page and billionaire businessman Ross Perot, and it thinks it could be operating in space by 2025.

One of the difficulties facing these would-be space miners is cost, which is fittingly astronomical. Nasa’s Osiris-Rex expedition, which aims to bring just two kilos of asteroid material back to Earth by 2023, is set to cost $1bn. But Deep Space Industries thinks it can get the ball rolling by putting three of its Fireflies in space for just $20m.

The other obvious barrier is the technological progress that is still required if commercial asteroid mining is to become practically possible and economically viable.

However, considerable as these hurdles are, experts believe the legal component is the most pressing. Late last year, the US government made an attempt to update the law on space mining, producing a bill that allows companies to “possess, own, transport, use, and sell” extra-terrestrial resources without violating US law. The problem is that putting this into practice violates the OST.

“The way a private company would enforce their right to mine is through a national court,” says space law expert Dr Chris Newman of the University of Sunderland. “In making a ruling, that court would exercise sovereign rights, contravening the OST. We will only know how this would play out if it is tested in court.”

US lawyer Michael Listner, who founded thinktank Space Law and Policy Solutions, says the US law is incompatible with the OST and risks souring international relations: “China and Russia will want in. If you have conflicts of law, things start getting dicey and that could lead to legal and political conflict.”

Newman believes that one reason why Luxembourg has included plans for drawing up a regulatory framework is to show the world that work is under way on untangling such legal knots. “This is something for investors to hang their hat on,” he says, “to give them confidence and say that there is a nascent legal framework.”

But Dr Gbenga Oduntan, a space law expert at the University of Kent, warns that the international community needs to get its act together quickly. “What we don’t want is a free-for-all over asteroids,” he says. “We need to come together and do that thinking, because the law we have right now does not allow us to repatriate resources for commercial purposes.”

One way to do this, he suggests, is to draw on existing legislation such as the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which governs how nations use the ocean. Another option might be to revive the Moon Treaty of 1979, which deemed space to be the “common heritage of mankind” but failed to win support from any space-faring nation.

Such complex legal wrangles could indeed prove harder to overcome than other difficulties, such as the huge costs involved. But some experts believe that investing large amounts early on could create a space economy in which costs are forced down by collaboration.

Ian Crawford, professor of planetary science at Birkbeck, London, says asteroid miners would most probably start off by mining water-ice, which can be broken down into hydrogen (for fuel) and oxygen (for supporting life).
It is much cheaper to produce water in space than to take it there, and this process could generate revenue and technical support from other players in the space game. Once companies had that revenue stream under their belts, they could start thinking more seriously about the more costly business of extracting minerals and bringing them back to Earth.

“Eventually you can imagine the whole process supporting itself,” says Crawford. “The main hurdle is the initial investment, and it seems these companies think they can get started and jump over that hurdle.” But he agrees that the more pressing concern is the legal picture, which “badly needs to be updated”.

Christopher Barnatt, professional futurist and author of The Next Big Thing: From 3D Printing to Mining the Moon, says history shows us that if governments such as Luxembourg’s get behind asteroid mining, the space industry will deliver on its promise.

“With the moon landings, the aspiration was way ahead of the technology. [President] Kennedy had spoken to Nasa and they’d said it couldn’t be done. He thought it could. We’ve got evidence from throughout history that when we commit ourselves to a broad goal, we can achieve it.”
The ramifications could be huge, he believes, as progress in one technology spurs breakthroughs in another.
“If you can use asteroids to make fuel, a lot of space exploration becomes cheaper. Then there’s progress in robotics and artificial intelligence... it all starts to make things possible.”

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/feb/06/asteroid-mining-space-minerals-legal-issues
 
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Really, there's so much stuff up there to go round. There is no need for nations to squabble over asteroids or the resources of the planets.
 
There are vast distances in space. It's not just about quantity of resources, but logistics that will be fought over. And not by nations, but by corporations. As though terrestrial politics isn't already manipulated by corporate interests enough, extraterrestrial politics will likely see nations squabbling to suck up to those corporations in control of those resources.
 
Dubai has undertaken to establish and maintain a 'space court' for adjudicating off-planet legal disputes - particularly ones related to private companies and commercial operations.
First It Was Space Force, Now Dubai's Creating a 'Space Court' For Off-Planet Disputes

Dubai announced Monday the creation of a "space court" to settle commercial disputes, as the UAE - which is also sending a probe to Mars - builds its presence in the space sector.

The tribunal will be based at the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Courts, an independent British-inspired arbitration centre based on common law.

Space law is governed by international conventions and resolutions, including the UN Outer Space Treaty which entered into force in 1967. Several states have also signed bilateral or multilateral agreements to regulate their space activities.

However, while until recently the field was almost exclusively the domain of nations and institutions, space has become a commercial issue involving more and more private companies.

"An integrated space industry, supported by human resources, infrastructure, and scientific research, is under way," Zaki Azmi, Chief Justice at DIFC Courts, said in a statement.

"The Courts of Space is a global initiative that will operate in parallel, helping to build a new judicial support network to serve the stringent commercial demands of international space exploration in the 21st century." ...

FULL STORY: https://www.sciencealert.com/dubai-...a-space-court-for-settling-off-earth-disputes
 
Codifying Space Laws & Regulations.

US President Joe Biden's administration is drafting an executive order intended to streamline approval for private rocket launches amid a broader effort to bring legal and regulatory clarity for American companies on everything from space travel to private space stations.

According to officials familiar with the effort, the order would be part of a push by the White House's National Space Council to modernize US space regulation, which has failed to keep up with the increasingly ambitious pace of private-sector investment and development.

The order, slated to be ready for Biden to sign by early 2023, is meant to simplify licensing procedures under existing laws for more routine space activities like launching rockets and deploying satellites, said one of the sources, who asked not to be named.

The order will task the US Department of Commerce with creating an online tool to help guide companies through various agencies' licensing processes for space-related activities, one of the sources said.

US Vice President Kamala Harris, who chairs the National Space Council, has signaled her intention to codify new rules for private space activities, but the plan for the executive order has not been reported.

A spokeswoman for Harris did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

While past administrations have made little progress revamping US space laws, the Biden administration's broader effort to spur new rules, in addition to those targeted in the executive order, comes with greater urgency because of the pace of private investment in space. NASA also is pushing to privatize much of its low-Earth orbit activities. ...

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/20...ng-rules-for-the-lawless-place-that-is-space/
 
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