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Comment by Matt3o12_ | Hacker News Reader

What fair solution could be reached? I think it is extremely important to let the private sector mine as long as it fullfills certain safety and environmental standards. We have seen that the private sector is capable of so much more (just look at spaceX).

But I also see the need for regulations so that one company can't claim all plantes to mine while still having an advantage because they were the first to start mining. How could territories be distributed fairly so that innovation is possible (and encourage by financial gains) and that there are no monopolies (so that only one country or only one space agency from one country, which would be pretty counterproductive).

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"one company can't claim all plantes to mine while still having an advantage because they were the first to start mining"

That is physically impossible.

While the international laws and conventions have lapsed, they can easily be brought back, and one of the principles of settling is that you can't claim something you can't defend. The principles will need to be tweaked a bit since the way in which "defense" is used here isn't 100% applicable, but you could easily say that you have to be occupying it, for instance. There is no way to squat on the million best asteroids.

By the time that's not true, our great-grandchildren will have worked out the principles of solving that problem. It may be fun to speculate on their answers, but it's nothing more.

What qualifies as "occupying"? Does a person need to live there (not viable for small asteroids) or is it enough if I attach I iPhone sized tagging device to it?

"I'll know it when I see it" really will get you through at least a decade or two. It's not like the doors are going to open and twenty million people are going to emigrate to the asteroid belt overnight.

It would be almost impossible to regulate space. These satellites are tiny and millions of miles away.

You should see the problems we have with illegal fishing about 10 miles off our coast.

I don't disagree with you, I just think the practicalities of monitoring and enforcement would be almost impossible.

The scale of the capital enterprise required to pull this off in the next 50 years practically guarantees it will be a political issue if it happens in our lifetime.

You can't sweep space mining under the rug.

We're a long way off freebooters with fusion drives. And when we have those, AI will see you from 5 AUs out

What country writes those regulations? Whose claim is valid?

I think that's where things get interesting and earth politics get involved. Who should have a say? Spacefaring nations or all of earth? [I think this is your point, just being explicit I guess].

A auction in which everyone interested bids on access to an asteroid based on...

- Time they have access to asteroid

- Type of resource they want to extract

- Quantity of resource they want to extract

Time cost is paid upfront and distributed evenly amongst worlds countries.

Type/Qty is paid for on return to Earth in either cash or using resource itself.

This sounds reasonable to me. Can anyone point out some shortcomings of an auction-approach? The only thing that stands out to me is if a party has the means they can buy every auction out.

There will also be people who do not intend to return to Earth.

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