Should We Mine The Asteroids?

Explanation: In theory, a multitude of valuable minerals await exploration and exploitation ... on the asteroids, planetoids, and other planetary bodies of our solar system!

Once the stuff of science fiction, already start-up companies such as The Asteroid Mining Company are hedging bets and preparing for the day when the riches will be ours (well, theirs).

Open-pit mine in the southern Atacama of northern Chile.
For better or worse, such operations can permanently scar the landscape
far beyond the actual mining site itself ... as shown here with
tangles of roads, an airstrip, and settlements, all with
their secondary impacts of erosion and pollution.

Aside from questions of who actually owns the asteroids (or the Moon, or Mars, or even Antarctica or Arctic ocean minerals for that matter), I wish to raise a question of more central ethics: should we mine the asteroids (and other planetary bodies)?

Or, perhaps more realistic, should there be some regulations providing guidance for such activities?

A closer look at the mine shown above.
For scale, those are large buildings at the bottom center of the photo.

And why is this of interest to an ecologist?

Asteroids and other "minor" planetary and planetoid bodies, including comets and meteoroids, have been shown to harbor some of the building blocks of life, including hydrocarbons, amino acids, and even (ice) water. Unfettered surface mining, such as some of the images proposed in this week's EPOW, could lead to irreversible pollution of the surface and subsurface, wide disruption of chemical processes, and loss of potentially valuable opportunities to study extraterrestrial biochemistry as possible precursors to life itself.

And this is besides the issue of esthetics of a landscape forever scarred by such activities.

This is the unreal, immense Martha Mine located in the town of Waihi,
North Island, New Zealand. This mine has produces vast amounts of gold
since its discovery here in 1878.
You can't even see the bottom from up here.

The riches may be real, and of tremendous value to whatever nation can eventually get to, exploit, and return the mineral treasures. Chances are, this will happen. We just might want to proceed with some forethought and care.

And perhaps mining regulations could become part of a broader Interplanetary Environmental Protection Act.

This is a massive fluorite mine I visited in Primorski Krai
of the Russian Far East.

Finally, enjoy this red-blue 3-D anaglyph image
(break out your 3-D glasses!) of the massive
mine in northern Chile.

EPOW - Ecology Picture of the Week