Elon Musk is a visionary, a gambler, and a very smart human. In 2002, he founded SpaceX with the vision of creating a reusable rocket booster that could eventually send humans to settle on Mars. His vision of making the internet available to all is well on the way to becoming a reality.
SpaceX is a private company. They have contracted with NASA to deliver on specific projects, such as the Moon lander that Artemis may someday use to travel to the surface of our satellite. The company has also contracted with NASA to shuttle astronauts to and from the International Space Station (ISS).
SpaceX has also done classified work for the U.S. Space Force and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). It is about to become the most valuable company in history when Musk offers SpaceX shares to the public. The initial public offering (IPO), estimated to crack $1.5 trillion, is expected to make Elon Musk the world's first trillionaire.
Investors are gambling that SpaceX will continue to break new ground in the race to exploit the extraordinary riches found in outer space. There are gases like Helium-3 that are very rare on Earth, but plentiful on the Moon. Unlike current nuclear fission (which splits atoms) or standard fusion (using tritium), a fusion reaction using Helium-3 and deuterium would produce virtually no radioactive waste.
It is estimated that about 25 tons of Helium-3 could power the entire United States for a full year.
There could also be thousands of tons of ice hiding in lunar craters that, once broken down into hydrogen and oxygen, can not only supply water for colonies, but also create fuel for rockets to Mars and beyond.
As of now, such ventures are science fiction. It's not just a question of getting there and landing. Mining the Moon or an asteroid would require new construction techniques, swarms of AI robots, anchoring mechanisms to keep a spacecraft from drifting away, and a host of other technologies that are barely imaginable. And that's just mining the minerals. The bigger problem is profitability: How can you get the product from millions of miles away to customers on Earth and make any money doing it?
A private California-based company, AstroForge, wants to try. They are one of the leaders in the infant space-mining industry.
In February 2025, AstroForge launched a spaceship atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and sent a probe called Odin toward an asteroid designated 2022 OB5. However, soon after launch, the ground crew lost touch with the ship. Speculation about what happened centered on the solar panels failing to deploy.
The company has another spacecraft under construction and is expecting to launch it later this year. This time, AstroForge is aiming to grab the brass ring. Matthew Gialich, the company’s cofounder and CEO, was asked what the spacecraft will do.
“F***ing land on an asteroid,” he replied.
If the mission goes the way of Odin, its investors could get cold feet—and AstroForge might go the way of Icarus. But if his team succeeds, we’ll be one step closer to making asteroid mining a reality. In the process, AstroForge stands to become one of the most valuable businesses on Earth—and will have changed the future of spaceflight itself.
Right now, there are several dozen entrepreneurs considered serious enough to raise millions of dollars from investors. What is science fiction right now could become a reality by 2040.
Most asteroids reside within the asteroid belt, which orbits the Sun between Mars and Jupiter. But plenty also scoot about closer to home: To date, astronomers have discovered around 40,000 near-Earth asteroids, the sort that planetary defense researchers are especially interested in. And that number is set to rise dramatically: The U.S.-controlled Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile began operations in 2025, and its remarkable eyesight is predicted to find 89,000 more near-Earth asteroids; NASA’s space-based Near-Earth Object Surveyor mission, the first space telescope specifically designed to spy stealthy asteroids hidden by the sun’s glare, is set to launch as early as 2027.
"For now, AstroForge isn’t interested in the plausibility of mining asteroids at scale," reports Popular Mechanics. "It’s a myth that only starts to become a reality if something else happens first: A scrappy startup flies to a metallic asteroid, for a fraction of the cost of any comparable mission by a government space agency."
Not all asteroids are made up of the same stuff. The really valuable ones might be almost solid metal.
There are three main asteroid groups: the waterlogged, carbon-rich C-types, which make up about 75 percent of all known asteroids; the second-most common stony S-types; and finally, the supposedly metallic iron-and nickel-rich M-types. The last group is thought to also contain precious platinum-group metals like iridium, osmium, palladium, platinum, rhodium, and ruthenium—sought-after elements used in everything from jewelry to electronics.
AstroForge is hoping that 2022 OB5 is a Class M asteroid. If it is, and the enormous technical problems of mining, transporting, and refining metals retrieved from an asteroid can be overcome, Mr. Gialich and his fellow space mining entrepreneurs will reap rewards beyond the dreams of avarice.
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