Odin in the warrior field: the American mission has opened a race for resources in space

The beginning of the space "gold rush" may be the American private mission of the Odin spacecraft, if it proves successful. Its target is the asteroid 2022 OB₅, which experts assume is rich in platinoids and rare earth elements. The spacecraft is expected to reach the asteroid in December, carry out its spectral analysis and send data to Earth. However, at the moment, communication with the satellite has not been established. For more information about the goals and objectives of the mission, see the Izvestia article.

The Odin mission

On February 27 at 03:16 Moscow time, a Falcon-9 launch vehicle took place from the Kennedy Space Center (USA, Florida) . She successfully launched the Nova-C landing module called Athena ("Athena") on a flight path to the Moon, developed by Intuitive Machines.

The Odin spacecraft was also placed on the Falcon-9 as an additional payload. It was manufactured by the aerospace company AstroForge. The device is a 100-kilogram satellite platform, which houses research equipment.

The purpose of the mission is the exploration of the asteroid 2022 OB₅. This is a small celestial body that belongs to the near-Earth group. Such objects periodically approach our planet, so they are relatively easily accessible for study by spacecraft.

— 2022 OB₅ can be classified as M-class asteroids, which consist mainly of iron and can include up to 9%, and sometimes more, nickel. They may also contain an increased content of platinoids and other rare metals and rare earth elements," Evgeny Slyuta, head of the Laboratory of Geochemistry of the Moon and Planets at the Vernadsky Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences, explained to Izvestia.

According to the developers' plans, Odin will reach the asteroid at the end of the year. It is assumed that it will fly around the celestial body, conduct its spectral analysis and send data to Earth. At the moment of approaching the asteroid, Odin will be located at a distance of about 8.5 million km from Earth. This will ensure stable communication and high-speed information transfer.

As announced in AstroForge, the main task of the company is to become the first to start commercially extracting resources in space. Therefore, Odin, first of all, must determine to what extent 2022 OB₅ is rich in minerals.

If the AstroForge expedition proves successful and its results confirm the high content of valuable resources for 2022 OB₅, this could launch a space "gold rush", experts say.

— It is not yet known for certain what useful resources asteroid 2022 OB₅ possesses. First of all, it attracted attention with its orbit, similar to Earth's. This allows you to approach it close to our planet, and the launch windows (the moment of approach to the Earth) They appear every year for flights to this asteroid," explained Leonid Elenin, an astronomer and researcher at the Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

At the same time, he noted that after Odin was launched into space, communication with him was not established. This may mean failure of a number of on-board systems and loss of control of the device.

Mining in space

Leonid Elenin stressed that Odin is only a reconnaissance mission, it should establish the physical parameters of the asteroid. Following it, without waiting for the results, AstroForge specialists intend to send the next satellite by 2022 OB₅. It will be a 200-kilogram Vestri machine. His tasks will already include docking with an asteroid. This device is planned to be launched in the summer of 2025 along with the third lunar mission of the Nova-C3 spacecraft.

— If successful, Vestri will be the first private campaign to land on a celestial body outside the Earth-Moon system. This will bring us closer to the realization of the mission to ensure the availability of alien resources for all mankind, — reported on the AstroForge website.

However, according to experts, the direct delivery of resources may not begin until several decades later. As Leonid Elenin noted, so far humanity has been able to deliver to Earth only 121 g of matter lifted from the surface of asteroids in one mission. For the extraction of rare earth elements and their delivery to Earth, drilling and processing of the dumped rock is necessary.

— The study of asteroids from spacecraft is primarily of scientific interest. Mining on them is economically impractical in the coming centuries. Because there are already enough proven reserves of metals, rare metals and rare earth elements on Earth, and it is more convenient and cheaper to extract them," Evgeny Slyuta believes.

At the same time, in his opinion, mining resources on asteroids will be profitable when they are processed in space. Already in this century, such enterprises can be created on the Moon to provide local infrastructure and for deep space exploration.

— In our country they are also designing technologies for the development of space resources. In particular, asteroids rich in noble and rare earth metals are of interest. Such projects involve delivering small asteroids to near-Earth orbit, where they are much easier to develop. These measures can be carried out with the help of existing domestic technology," Nathan Eismont, a leading researcher at the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Izvestia.

For example, he explained, equipment for performing gravitational maneuvers can be delivered to an asteroid and its flight trajectory can be changed so that it enters an orbit resonant with the earth. Thus, the celestial body will periodically return to our planet and fly near it. At this time, it will not be difficult to send spacecraft to the asteroid to extract useful resources.

At the same time, as Nathan Eismont noted, a NASA mission to the asteroid Psyche, which is considered to be the protoplanet's metallic core, is currently underway. According to some calculations, its resource reserves are estimated at $10 quadrillion (10 thousand trillion). This mission was launched in 2023, and it is expected to reach its goal in 2026.