It ain’t easy creating your own nation, and here’s the history to prove it.
No announcement yet, but of the many stories available this Wired article appears to provide the best overview of the asteroid mining plans of Planetary Resources.
The company’s first phase is most interesting:
Within the next 18 to 24 months, Planetary Resources hopes to launch between two and five space-based telescopes at an estimated cost of a few million dollars each that will identify potentially valuable asteroids. Other than their size and orbit, little detailed information is available about the current catalog of near-Earth asteroids. Planetary Resources’ Arkyd-101 Space Telescopes will figure out whether any are worth the trouble of resource extraction.
The actual press conference is scheduled for 10:30 am (Pacific). Stay tuned.
Update: The Planetary Resources website has now been updated. You can read more about their space telescope proposal here.
