Just to add a bit more to the other answers here.
First - that any future attempt to refine the ownership - seems it should be done within the Outer Space Treaty - because that's the only relevant law that's widely accepted - and experience with the Moon treaty shows how hard it is to bring in a new space law. And so many countries have now ratified the OST - doesn't seem too likely that they can all agree to changing it.
But - it's not such a major issue as - for foreseeable future - most land in space is essentially valueless to colonists, or settlers - at least as a place to live - and only becomes valuable when you build a habitat there - except for a few special locations - such as say the peaks of eternal light at poles of the Moon. And if you build a habitat - then you own your habitat under the Outer Space Treaty.
So some kind of functional ownership like that would do for most situations such as
If we have colonization in space - I can only see that working myself in big habitats such as a Stanford Torus, O'Neil cylinder or similar.
Reason is - because smaller habitats, if they need to be engineered to withstand tons per square meter - will always be hugely more expensive than any similar habitat on Earth - and especially bearing in mind that in space conditions they will probably need to be replaced every few decades.
But if you have a large reasonably low maintenance Stanford Torus or similar - if that can be got to work - then it could be reasonably cost effective to live inside it.
If this is true - then the only places in space of any value to colonists are inside huge habitats - and the habitats would be owned by whoever built them, even under the existing OST.
I think this also is helpful as far as maintaining peace in space. Because - if we could own bits of the Moon or Mars or asteroids, comets, or whatever would be a potential source of conflict - and war in space would be disastrous.
But if you build a habitat - then is reasonable enough to claim ownership of it - and not likely to be controversial in the way it would be if several people claim the same solar system body or feature. And there is no shortage of materials for making habitats either - especially free flying habitats.
Actually best place to build I think myself outside of Earth are floating "cloud nine" tensegrity sphere type habitats in the upper atmosphere of Venus. Only constructions that we can do with normal atmospheric pressure inside and out, and that hugely simplifies construction of the settlements. Don't want to go into details here, but try my: Robert Walker's answer to Why are we thinking about a Mars colony when a Venus colony would be more technically feasible? It seems that radiation shielded floating colonies could be assembled on Venus, with plastic film and aluminum wire bags, filled with breathable air.
Again - if those were ever built - then it is entirely reasonable to say that you own the habitat you or your country built - and nobody would want to own the surface of Venus - because your habitats go around it every 4 days and never spend any time over any particular spot.
That leaves space mining. Here the situation is far harder to address.
The problem is - not that there is any shortage of resources in space. One NEO would have trillions of dollars worth of platinum for instance. And any source for ice - say poles of the Moon - or the Martian moon Phobos - probably has enough ice to fuel spaceships for centuries.
And - if we did permit companies to have habitat type occupation zones covering an entire say 300 meter diameter NEO and your space mining rival has claimed one of them in that way - you can just go to another one. There are plenty of them to choose from even close to Earth as regards delta v, and if we start mining the asteroid belt - is essentially inexhaustible until you have colonies for trillions of people in space.
The problem is - that if space miners are able to establish ownership of space resources - then what happens in the long term future? If they can sell the platinum back to Earth - and retain all the profits - then they could quickly become the most wealthy entities on Earth.
Eventually single companies, even individuals, might end up, far wealthier even than entire countries. Maybe you would end up with a single international company - or a single "Bill Gates" type individual even - who is wealthier than the US or China - not just in the resources they own but their yearly earnings as well.
They might be the future equivalent of our oil nations, but wealthier than those.
Then, just depending on the actions of these few entities - we might then get crises like the 1973 oil crisis - which put many of the third world countries into heavy debt. Millions of people world wide are still suffering from the side effects of debts their countries incurred during the short oil crisis in 1973. which was a result of a small cartel of oil producing countries.
The same thing could happen in space. Entire Earth could be subject to the whims of whoever controls space mining. Which by then - with huge amounts of money to be earned - might not be the idealistic folk that are keen on it right now.
This could lead to massive financial instability, to huge debt crises, and other major issues.
Here I'm imagining a future where, for instance, the majority of the world economy is from space mining. And where we have become dependent, e.g. on cheap platinum from space - or other similar resources that are rare on the Earth.
Seems not at all impossible given the vastness of resources available in space.
Just as happened in 1973, a short crisis precipitated by actions of a few individuals or companies in space might plunge most or all the nations of the Earth into debt too great for them to repay, and requiring massive restructuring of their economies, and cutting back on public services just to service the interest payments..
And that situation might then continue for decades. It is now forty years since the 1973 crisis and many countries still suffer greatly from the effects.
I don't know what the answer is. Some countries have argued for benefit sharing that there should be some kind of provision for the space miners to return some of their profits to the Earth - and to have it shared amongst all nations, not just those with the capability to get into space.
Myself - do have personal sympathies for benefit sharing, as someone from the UK - a country with e.g. national health taken for granted, unemployment benefit etc etc. But no country can expect entire world to follow similar systems to their own.
Here we need something that can be agreed on generally amongst all the nations of the Earth, similarly to the OST. And not just the space faring nations - I don't think they have a wide enough perspective to come up with the best answer for the world as a whole..
I can see that in the early stages - that it is reasonable for the space miners to retain much of the profit because they take the risks.
But - later on - I think there needs to be some compensating mechanism to make sure that they do not gain so much power and wealth as to undermine Earth's economy - and lead to financial disasters and wars.
I'm not a lawyer myself, and am not an economist, but see this from a humanitarian and philosophical background.
Though some of the lawyers' papers talk about ways of dealing with the ownership issues - and they seem fine for scientific outposts, tourist hotels, explorers etc - I have yet to see any satisfactory explanation of how to deal with ownership and profits from space mining.
And - I think it won't just "work out" without some form of legal framework. We need law in space even more so than on the Earth, or we will head for disaster.
And also works both ways - the space miners also need some sort of legal re-assurance that they own what they return to Earth - is not really that clear under the OST that they even own the platinum that they mine given that it is a shared resource for all humanity.
If they mine space resources purely for their own individual profit - are they not perhaps stealing something from space that, by rights, belongs to all of us? The OST would seem to suggest space resources belong to us all.
Although it doesn't go so far as spelling out a system of benefit sharing - yet - it doesn't make it clear that anyone can claim ownership of resources in space either. If you don't own the resources - is it really yours to mine, or to sell to others or to Earth? And given that nobody else owns the resources either, who could possibly grant ownership to you?
Perhaps benefit sharing can be part of some mutual contract between space miners, and all the nations of the Earth - that provides some kind of functional ownership and permission to return resources from space and sell them to us, for benefit of the miners, but also in a way that safeguards the Earth as well?
But I'm not a lawyer or economist and don't know how that could be spelt out in detail and made into a workable plan.
I only know of one space mining company that suggested some form of benefit sharing and that's Jim Keravala, of theShackleton Energy Co.
He is strongly in favour of both benefit sharing and sharing of technology with other countries at a service level, so they can have their own space programs and opportunities. Much in the way they have access to airplane technology and GPS services, at a level permitted under arms control regulations.
He talks about it here, with some passion, 34 minutes in : the SpaceShow, Friday, 12-14-12. He believes that by the end of this century we could establish a society which, world wide, has no child without health, well being, education, and freedom to choose their future, and that that is not a utopian vision but something we can realistically achieve.
Sadly, the other space mining companies don't seem to have a similar benefit sharing based vision of the future - or ideas that would ensure that it works out on some other basis - and Shackleton energy have not been too successful so far - they did one crowd funded project which failed to meet its target.
As a result, just because of this, I am quite concerned myself about where space mining might take us in the future. It has great potential for benefiting the Earth - and solving many of our technological, and economic issues, and even completely eliminating poverty and issues of access to health services and education - as Jim Kervala envisages.
But it also has great potential for destabilising our situation and causing massive hardship - if not dealt with carefully with foresight.
I've heard some people argue that there is no need to bother about this, because things will just work out automatically for our good world wide, if we just permit the space miners to do unregulated business in space.
But I think the 1973 oil crisis shows clearly that we can't just go ahead with any reasonable assurance based on such ideas.
It makes me even more concerned indeed when people talk like this. Unless they can answer this question and show why the 1973 oil crisis or something similar will not happen in space.
Will Anyone Ever Own Their Own Land In Space - And May We Get Wars In Space In The Future?
First - that any future attempt to refine the ownership - seems it should be done within the Outer Space Treaty - because that's the only relevant law that's widely accepted - and experience with the Moon treaty shows how hard it is to bring in a new space law. And so many countries have now ratified the OST - doesn't seem too likely that they can all agree to changing it.
But - it's not such a major issue as - for foreseeable future - most land in space is essentially valueless to colonists, or settlers - at least as a place to live - and only becomes valuable when you build a habitat there - except for a few special locations - such as say the peaks of eternal light at poles of the Moon. And if you build a habitat - then you own your habitat under the Outer Space Treaty.
So some kind of functional ownership like that would do for most situations such as
- Scientific outposts
- Tourism, hotels, retirement homes
- Settlement
SPACE COLONIZATION IN LARGE HABITATS
If we have colonization in space - I can only see that working myself in big habitats such as a Stanford Torus, O'Neil cylinder or similar.
Reason is - because smaller habitats, if they need to be engineered to withstand tons per square meter - will always be hugely more expensive than any similar habitat on Earth - and especially bearing in mind that in space conditions they will probably need to be replaced every few decades.
But if you have a large reasonably low maintenance Stanford Torus or similar - if that can be got to work - then it could be reasonably cost effective to live inside it.
If this is true - then the only places in space of any value to colonists are inside huge habitats - and the habitats would be owned by whoever built them, even under the existing OST.
NON OWNERSHIP OF SOLAR SYSTEM AS PROMOTING PEACE
I think this also is helpful as far as maintaining peace in space. Because - if we could own bits of the Moon or Mars or asteroids, comets, or whatever would be a potential source of conflict - and war in space would be disastrous.
But if you build a habitat - then is reasonable enough to claim ownership of it - and not likely to be controversial in the way it would be if several people claim the same solar system body or feature. And there is no shortage of materials for making habitats either - especially free flying habitats.
VENUS CLOUD NINE TENSEGRITY
Actually best place to build I think myself outside of Earth are floating "cloud nine" tensegrity sphere type habitats in the upper atmosphere of Venus. Only constructions that we can do with normal atmospheric pressure inside and out, and that hugely simplifies construction of the settlements. Don't want to go into details here, but try my: Robert Walker's answer to Why are we thinking about a Mars colony when a Venus colony would be more technically feasible? It seems that radiation shielded floating colonies could be assembled on Venus, with plastic film and aluminum wire bags, filled with breathable air.
Again - if those were ever built - then it is entirely reasonable to say that you own the habitat you or your country built - and nobody would want to own the surface of Venus - because your habitats go around it every 4 days and never spend any time over any particular spot.
SPACE MINING
That leaves space mining. Here the situation is far harder to address.
The problem is - not that there is any shortage of resources in space. One NEO would have trillions of dollars worth of platinum for instance. And any source for ice - say poles of the Moon - or the Martian moon Phobos - probably has enough ice to fuel spaceships for centuries.
And - if we did permit companies to have habitat type occupation zones covering an entire say 300 meter diameter NEO and your space mining rival has claimed one of them in that way - you can just go to another one. There are plenty of them to choose from even close to Earth as regards delta v, and if we start mining the asteroid belt - is essentially inexhaustible until you have colonies for trillions of people in space.
The problem is - that if space miners are able to establish ownership of space resources - then what happens in the long term future? If they can sell the platinum back to Earth - and retain all the profits - then they could quickly become the most wealthy entities on Earth.
Eventually single companies, even individuals, might end up, far wealthier even than entire countries. Maybe you would end up with a single international company - or a single "Bill Gates" type individual even - who is wealthier than the US or China - not just in the resources they own but their yearly earnings as well.
They might be the future equivalent of our oil nations, but wealthier than those.
Then, just depending on the actions of these few entities - we might then get crises like the 1973 oil crisis - which put many of the third world countries into heavy debt. Millions of people world wide are still suffering from the side effects of debts their countries incurred during the short oil crisis in 1973. which was a result of a small cartel of oil producing countries.
The same thing could happen in space. Entire Earth could be subject to the whims of whoever controls space mining. Which by then - with huge amounts of money to be earned - might not be the idealistic folk that are keen on it right now.
This could lead to massive financial instability, to huge debt crises, and other major issues.
Here I'm imagining a future where, for instance, the majority of the world economy is from space mining. And where we have become dependent, e.g. on cheap platinum from space - or other similar resources that are rare on the Earth.
Seems not at all impossible given the vastness of resources available in space.
Just as happened in 1973, a short crisis precipitated by actions of a few individuals or companies in space might plunge most or all the nations of the Earth into debt too great for them to repay, and requiring massive restructuring of their economies, and cutting back on public services just to service the interest payments..
And that situation might then continue for decades. It is now forty years since the 1973 crisis and many countries still suffer greatly from the effects.
BENEFIT SHARING
I don't know what the answer is. Some countries have argued for benefit sharing that there should be some kind of provision for the space miners to return some of their profits to the Earth - and to have it shared amongst all nations, not just those with the capability to get into space.
Myself - do have personal sympathies for benefit sharing, as someone from the UK - a country with e.g. national health taken for granted, unemployment benefit etc etc. But no country can expect entire world to follow similar systems to their own.
Here we need something that can be agreed on generally amongst all the nations of the Earth, similarly to the OST. And not just the space faring nations - I don't think they have a wide enough perspective to come up with the best answer for the world as a whole..
I can see that in the early stages - that it is reasonable for the space miners to retain much of the profit because they take the risks.
But - later on - I think there needs to be some compensating mechanism to make sure that they do not gain so much power and wealth as to undermine Earth's economy - and lead to financial disasters and wars.
I'm not a lawyer myself, and am not an economist, but see this from a humanitarian and philosophical background.
Though some of the lawyers' papers talk about ways of dealing with the ownership issues - and they seem fine for scientific outposts, tourist hotels, explorers etc - I have yet to see any satisfactory explanation of how to deal with ownership and profits from space mining.
And - I think it won't just "work out" without some form of legal framework. We need law in space even more so than on the Earth, or we will head for disaster.
And also works both ways - the space miners also need some sort of legal re-assurance that they own what they return to Earth - is not really that clear under the OST that they even own the platinum that they mine given that it is a shared resource for all humanity.
If they mine space resources purely for their own individual profit - are they not perhaps stealing something from space that, by rights, belongs to all of us? The OST would seem to suggest space resources belong to us all.
Although it doesn't go so far as spelling out a system of benefit sharing - yet - it doesn't make it clear that anyone can claim ownership of resources in space either. If you don't own the resources - is it really yours to mine, or to sell to others or to Earth? And given that nobody else owns the resources either, who could possibly grant ownership to you?
Perhaps benefit sharing can be part of some mutual contract between space miners, and all the nations of the Earth - that provides some kind of functional ownership and permission to return resources from space and sell them to us, for benefit of the miners, but also in a way that safeguards the Earth as well?
But I'm not a lawyer or economist and don't know how that could be spelt out in detail and made into a workable plan.
I only know of one space mining company that suggested some form of benefit sharing and that's Jim Keravala, of theShackleton Energy Co.
He is strongly in favour of both benefit sharing and sharing of technology with other countries at a service level, so they can have their own space programs and opportunities. Much in the way they have access to airplane technology and GPS services, at a level permitted under arms control regulations.
He talks about it here, with some passion, 34 minutes in : the SpaceShow, Friday, 12-14-12. He believes that by the end of this century we could establish a society which, world wide, has no child without health, well being, education, and freedom to choose their future, and that that is not a utopian vision but something we can realistically achieve.
Sadly, the other space mining companies don't seem to have a similar benefit sharing based vision of the future - or ideas that would ensure that it works out on some other basis - and Shackleton energy have not been too successful so far - they did one crowd funded project which failed to meet its target.
HUGE POTENTIAL BENEFITS - BUT MASSIVE HARDSHIPS ALSO POTENTIALLY - FROM SPACE MINING
As a result, just because of this, I am quite concerned myself about where space mining might take us in the future. It has great potential for benefiting the Earth - and solving many of our technological, and economic issues, and even completely eliminating poverty and issues of access to health services and education - as Jim Kervala envisages.
But it also has great potential for destabilising our situation and causing massive hardship - if not dealt with carefully with foresight.
I've heard some people argue that there is no need to bother about this, because things will just work out automatically for our good world wide, if we just permit the space miners to do unregulated business in space.
But I think the 1973 oil crisis shows clearly that we can't just go ahead with any reasonable assurance based on such ideas.
It makes me even more concerned indeed when people talk like this. Unless they can answer this question and show why the 1973 oil crisis or something similar will not happen in space.
Will Anyone Ever Own Their Own Land In Space - And May We Get Wars In Space In The Future?
About the Author
Robert Walker
Writer of articles on Mars and Space issues - Software Developer of Tune Smithy, Bounce Metronome etc.Studied at Wolfson College, Oxford
Lives in Isle of Mull
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