President Obama signs law giving US citizens rights to resources in space.
US President Barack Obama signed off on a lofty law concerning private rights to resources in space this week. It’s ignited the aspirations of the space exploration crowd in the US – a few of which have designs on mining in space.
Indeed, Obama inspired some first class hyperbole. Planetary Resources, a would-be asteroid explorer, went so far as to peg the law as the “single greatest recognition of property rights in history”.
Well, well. It’s unfortunate the space exploration class chose such climatic words for a moment that is indeed quite interesting if not quite so sexy. For the US, the move is momentous.
But it’s not like we’ve come to an end game where the juniors of the world can begin staking ground on the far side of the Moon and feel confident they have title to their far flung space dust and accompanying riches. (Or mineralization to use NI 43-101 language, but then that authority does not yet extend to space.)
So a word of advice. Just ignore the historic blather from the likes of Planetary Resources or Moon Express (another space explorer) in describing Obama’s move to approve of Congress’ latest legislation that stakes out legal ground for US – underline US – thinking on resource rights in space.
But still. It is momentous in the sense that the US is taking a stance; is giving voice to its view of how space can be exploited by its citizens. Of course any country could say something like the US did in its legislation which “entitles” US citizens to the fruits of space resources, and you could ignore it.
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