Luxembourg Goes All In on Highly Speculative Asteroid Mining
Tiny Luxembourg is aiming to be the BMOA (big man on asteroids) when it comes to extraterrestrial mining.
The government of Luxembourg expects to soon have in place both a new national space law and a national space agency, two key steps in the small European country’s outsized contribution to the development of a space resources industry.
“We found out that, in order to be successful, and in order to help businesses to develop in this sector, it needs several commitments,” said Etienne Schneider, deputy prime minister of Luxembourg and minister of finance, in remarks at the meeting.
Those commitments, he said, include a “fully committed” government, a legal framework, research and development funding and access to venture capital. “I think that Luxembourg can offer all this,” he said.
The next major milestone for the country’s space resources initiative is passage of a new national space law. That bill, he said, “will be voted on this month or, at the latest, next month.”
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4 responses to “Luxembourg Goes All In on Highly Speculative Asteroid Mining”
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What they are aiming for is to be the first “flag of convenience” country for space and collect their revenue for very little actual effort.
It’s what happens when there is too much talk and not enough effort. Someone needs to take the lead. But something in the original article caught my attention. ‘Schneider said… “We don’t really care where the money comes from,”…’ Now, see, talk like that appeals to my South American heritage. Great move, I say, great move! 😀
For very little effort compared to the total effort that eventually will be expended, you mean. For them, it’s still a large chunk of change to lay on the table. After all, this is basically what they did with GEO Comsats in the mid 1980s. Today they have 80% of European comsats operated by people based in Luxembourg. For instance, SES is one of SpaceX’s biggest commercial customers. Luxembourg won that bet in spite of the fact that one of their big friends inside the EU, France, was nearly hysterical over losing control of who talked to French Citizens at Prime Time News Hour each night. While that fear was assuaged for a while, it will finally be fully fulfilled when 20,000+ LEO ComSats in multiple constellations are bidding for each individual’s trade on a daily basis.
This is happening, this time, courtesy of our friends at Deep Space Industries, stirring the pot. This is exactly the sort of thing Rick Tumlinson tries to pull off, and so far, he’s winning, this time, for now. They’ve money in Prospector-X to test technology in LEO in the next 12 months. They’re putting money into Prospector-1 to head out looking for what’s at a number of asteroids by 2020. Planetary Resources is interested in similar ventures with them for LEO work and for the Deep Range. I could wish Europe were made of 1,000 Luxembourgs! Among other things it would mean lotsa wealthy customers for us!
Fund and fly Sea Dragon–and then we know they’re serious.