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Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships
Space Policy xxx (2017) 1e6
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Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships Carlos M. Entrena Utrilla Callejon del Angel 12 4E, 18006 Granada, Spain
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history: Received 10 February 2017 Accepted 12 March 2017 Available online xxx
NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program showed the potential of privatepublic partnerships (PPPs) to reduce cost of access to space, producing two launch vehicles and cargo capsules in record time and with a factor 20 cost reduction. This program was followed by the Commercial Crew Program (CCP), aiming to provide affordable human access to space, which should end in 2017 with the first flight of a commercial crew capsule. The same team that created COTS is now proposing the Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services (LCOTS) program, with the goal of developing cislunar capabilities, establish a human outpost on the Moon, and reduce cost and risk for future Mars missions. Private-public partnerships seem to be becoming NASA's tool of choice to develop affordable human access to space, increase capabilities, and incentivize the private space sector for a much lower cost than previous approaches. This paper wants to expand the use of the COTS-like programs by developing a concept of a COTS program for asteroid mining, simply referred to as Asteroid-COTS, or ACOTS for short. The paper uses the same methodology of the proposed LCOTS program, proposing a phased-development approach and evaluating which capabilities should be included in the program with a similar scheme. The result is a high-level ACOTS proposal with several synergies with the LCOTS program, and which could lead to the creation of a cislunar infrastructure to support permanent human presence in space. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Asteroid mining Private-public partnerships Commercial space New space
1. Introduction The Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program has been one of the most successful NASA programs of the last decade, yielding two commercial resupply vehicles and adding two new launchers to the US fleet in a much shorter time than NASA alone could, with a cost reduction of 20 to 1 [1]. These two vehicles now routinely resupply the ISS with both pressurized and unpressurized cargo, and one of the launchers, the Falcon 9, has established a strong presence in the global commercial launch market and is revolutionizing the launch industry with lower launch costs and reusability efforts. The successor of the COTS program, the Commercial Crew Program (CCP), is funding the development of two commercial crew vehicles for a much lower cost and shorter time than NASA's own efforts with Orion and SLS [2]. Both vehicles are expected to fly their demonstration missions in 2017, thus ending the American reliance on Russia to take crew to
the ISS that was created with the retirement of the Shuttle in 2011. The success of these programs shows the potential for privatepublic partnerships (PPPs) to reduce cost and risk in space activities, enabling affordable human access to space, and expanding the economic sphere of humanity into low Earth orbit (LEO). In order to expand humanity's economic sphere even further, the Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services (LCOTS) program is being proposed by the same team that created COTS. This program aims to demonstrate and enter into operation cislunar capabilities, while reducing risks and life-cycle costs for Mars missions [1]. The ideal output of the LCOTS program is an array of commercial companies that can provide affordable access to the Moon's surface, and deliver its resources (namely, propellant) to cislunar space for other space applications. When the LCOTS program is complete, Earth's economic sphere will include the Moon and its riches. However, the Moon is not the only possible source for space resources. Asteroids, in particular near-Earth asteroids (NEAs), can provide an alternative source for propellant and other materials, sometimes at lower cost. There are an expected 4000 NEAs that require less propellant (delta-V) per trip than the Moon's surface,
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Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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Abbreviations CCP COTS GEO ISS LCOTS LEO NEA PGM PPP ROI TRL
Commercial Crew Program Commercial Orbital Transportation Services Geostationary International Space Station Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services Low Earth Orbit Near-Earth Asteroid Platinum Group Metal Private-Public Partnership Return on Investment Technology Readiness Level
and the lack of differentiation creates higher mineral concentrations than any terrestrial or lunar deposits for certain elements [3]. This implies that NEAs are necessarily a part of the cislunar economy, and may compete with the Moon in the market for propellant and other materials. It is then interesting to ask whether or not a COTS-like program for asteroid mining would be beneficial for the industry and NASA, and how it can compete or collaborate with the LCOTS program. This paper aims to follow the methodology of the LCOTS proposal by Zuniga et al. [1] to study a possible Asteroid COTS-like (ACOTS) program, its relevance for the current state of the industry, and its relationship with the LCOTS program and the development of the cislunar economy as a whole.
2. The LCOTS program The Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services program was published first in 2015 by the same team that created the COTS program [1]. The goal is to develop a new strategy that leverages the US commercial space industry and entrepreneurial attributes to allow a return to the Moon within NASA's budgets, based on best practices from the COTS program. The idea is to take advantage of lunar resources for Mars exploration, without NASA having to incur in all the costs of developing the capabilities. The LCOTS proposal has three main objectives: 1. Demonstrate and enter into operation cis-lunar capabilities; 2. Reduce technical and operational risk to Mars mission concepts 3. Reduce life-cycle costs to Mars architectures. With these goals in mind, LCOTS proposes a phased development that allows incremental development and demonstration of capabilities, going in line with the COTS practice of providing several off-ramps for NASA and guaranteeing time between phases to evaluate progress. The three-phase program starts with resource prospecting and demonstration of landing capabilities, and ends with NASA contracts with several providers for the delivery of propellant to a cislunar station. The three phases can be summarized as follows: Phase I: demonstrate presence of and access to the desired resources, and extraction capabilities. Phase II: demonstrate capability to process resources, scalability, and delivery. Phase III: award of long-term contracts. These phases can be similarly applied to the development of an ACOTS program, since they essentially comply with all the COTS
best practices. In order to do this, the first step is to determine which asteroid resources are of interest for Mars and Moon missions, and for the cislunar economy. Then the objectives of the program will be set, and these will determine the potential capabilities to develop. These will then be evaluated following a similar scheme to that of Zuniga et al. [1], determining which capabilities should be left for the industry alone and which should NASA include in ACOTS. Final result is a high-level outline of a possible ACOTS program, which can be compared with the LCOTS program to find synergies, common ground, and to determine how they could be implemented best. 3. Asteroid resources Interest in asteroid mining has grown in recent years, with companies such as Deep Space Industries and Planetary Resources aiming to mine NEAs for propellant and other resources [4], [5]. NEAs contain most of the resources needed for space activities, from volatiles and water to structural metals and semiconductors, and most of them are, unlike planetary bodies, undifferentiated, that is, they present a more or less uniform composition with no core, mantle, and crust, which allows much higher concentrations of scarce metals than what can be found on Earth or the Moon. This, along with the fact that an expected 4000 NEAs require less propellant (delta-V) to access than the Moon's surface, makes them a very interesting target for mining resources for use in space, and in some cases return to Earth [3]. In the context of supporting missions to Mars and the Moon, and providing resources for the emerging cislunar economy, there are four kind of asteroid resources that are most interesting in the short term: water, ferrous metals, semiconductor metals, and platinum group metals (PGMs). These four resources will drive the selection of the capabilities for any potential ACOTS program: Water can be used as propellant, either as monopropellant in electric or solar thermal thrusters, or as bipropellant in the form of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. It can also be used for human consumption, either on its own or as a source of oxygen, and for radiation shielding purposes. It is estimated that between 50% and 60% of the NEA-mass could be water-rich carbonaceous asteroids [3]. Given the current cost of launch to orbit (about 1700 $/kg to LEO with SpaceX Falcon Heavy [6]), and considering that propellant is always the largest part of the mass of spacecraft, water could be the resource from asteroids that creates the largest cost reductions. Ferrous metals are widely abundant in the asteroid population (about 25%), making them ideal for the fabrication of structures, which require the greatest quantities of material. They could be used to manufacture structures for satellites and stations, and spare parts for on-orbit servicing. Manufacturing in space would allow for structures that do not have to withstand the stress of launch, permitting new configurations and designs, as well as structures too big to fit within a launcher's fairing [3]. Since most Mars and Moon architectures require assembly of assets in orbit [1], the availability of structural materials from asteroids would allow for larger spacecraft and stations. Semiconductors can be used for the production of solar panels, and potentially other electronics. Solar panels are essential for all the current space operations, based on solar power, and manufacturing them in space would reduce the necessary launch mass of all missions. This could enable markets that currently require too much launched mass to be affordable, such as space-based solar power, either for Earth or the Moon. Asteroid-derived solar panels would also be easier to deploy on the Moon's surface than those manufactured on Earth. Some
Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
C.M. Entrena Utrilla / Space Policy xxx (2017) 1e6
asteroids might be up to 7% elemental silicon, requiring little processing for extraction [3]. Platinum group metals (PGMs) are amongst the most valuable metals on Earth, with plenty of applications in modern industry [7]. The value of PGMs make them one of the few asteroidderived resources that could be brought back to Earth for a profit. Moreover, PGMs have been experiencing a market deficit for the past years, with mining production not being able to cover all the demand. This is expected to continue for the following years [8], increasing the prices and possibly enabling PGMs as a source of income for asteroid mining. Asteroids can provide an abundant supply of other resources, such as carbon, nitrogen, or calcium compounds, but will only be useful once the space economy is sufficiently developed to provide economically interesting uses for them. Others, such as titanium or aluminium, also exist in asteroids, but their relative abundances and the energy requirements of their extraction make them less appealing in their typical uses (structural alloys), than ferrous metals [3]. 4. Defining Asteroid-COTS As explained before, this paper applies the methodology exposed by Zuniga et al. for the LCOTS proposal [1] to study a potential ACOTS program. This methodology defines first the objectives and phases of the program, and then evaluates the capabilities that could be developed by the industry under a COTS-like program. The same process will be followed here. 4.1. Program objectives Following the spirit of LCOTS, the ultimate goal of the ACOTS program would be to reduce cost and risk for human exploration missions, either to the Moon or Mars. The resources available on asteroids could allow on-orbit refueling and manufacturing schemes that could induce reductions in cost these missions, but they could also stimulate the creation of new space-based markets such as satellite servicing, retrofitting, and repair. With this in mind, the proposed ACOTS program would have the following objectives: 1. Demonstrate and enter into operation asteroid prospecting and mining capabilities. 2. Demonstrate and enter into operation cislunar orbital capabilities. 3. Reduce life-cycle costs to Mars and Moon settlement mission concepts. These objectives align with the interests of the LCOTS program for cislunar orbital capabilities and cost reduction of Mars missions, while providing possible cost reductions for LCOTS itself. This synergy could be exploited by finding common capabilities between LCOTS and ACOTS to avoid redundancies, for example in the use of cislunar depots. Notice that the objectives do not make explicit reference to any particular kind of asteroid resource. This is intentional, and allows freedom when defining the capabilities to include only those resources that would be most interesting for a COTS-like program. 4.2. Possible development phases and capabilities These objectives could be accomplished in three phases with the same structure of the LCOTS program: assessment of resources, demonstration of resource extraction capabilities, and long-term
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contracts for material delivery services. The main differences appear in the technical implementation: while for the Moon several landers and rovers would be delivered to different places to obtain ground truth and prospect for resources, for asteroids several missions would have to be deployed to the different types of asteroids, in order to determine their exact composition and structure, and establish the most interesting targets. So while LCOTS focuses its initial stages on landing and rover capabilities, ACOTS would focus on deep space operations, and milli/microgravity mining techniques. The implementation of the LCOTS phases would be the following: Phase I: Resource assessment 1. Demonstrate capabilities for autonomous operations in deep space and near asteroids. 2. Prospect target asteroids for presence of resources. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for cost-effective resource extraction in target asteroids. Phase II: Asteroid resource extraction demonstration 1. Demonstrate capabilities for scaled-up resource extraction and delivery to cislunar space. 2. Demonstrate feasibility and scalability of resource processing in cislunar space. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for propellant and resource storage in cislunar space. Phase III: Asteroid resources delivery services. 1. NASA awards long-term contract for delivery of processed resources to cislunar space. 2. Awards are made to different providers. These phases provide, as in the LCOTS proposal, incremental development and several off-ramps and opportunities for evaluating progress. With these phases as a framework, the next step is to study the capabilities that are feasible for the industry to develop given its current maturity. For phases I and II, there are a number of high-level capabilities that could be included in the program. Phase I: Resource assessment 1. Prospecting spacecraft: deep space probes with NEA rendezvous capabilities. 2. Instrument packages: remote sensing instruments to determine composition of asteroids. 3. Processes: extraction, beneficiation, and production in milli/ microgravity environment of: a. Propellant b. Consumables (atmosphere, water) c. Structural (ferrous) metals d. Semiconductor metals e. PGMs Phase II: Asteroid resource extraction demonstration 1. Communications capability: communications network for large scale, deep space operations without reliance on NASA's Deep Space Network. 2. Industrial production: scaled up production and storage in cislunar space of: a. Propellant b. Consumables (atmosphere, water) c. Structural (ferrous) metals d. Semiconductor metals
Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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e. PGMs 3. Manufacturing: use of metals and semiconductors for: a. Structures and spare parts. b. Solar panels. 4. Storage depots: storage of propellant and other materials in cislunar space.
4.3. Evaluation of the potential capabilities The potential capabilities were evaluated with an evaluation scheme similar to the one used for LCOTS in Ref. [1], considering the maturity of the industry, the possibility of other markets outside of NASA, and their contribution for cost reduction for Mars and Moon missions. The evaluation scheme is shown in Table 1. The modification from the LCOTS evaluation scheme is the inclusion of the cost reduction possibilities for Moon missions, and only evaluating cost reduction for Mars missions, instead of overall risk reduction. This is justified because, while Moon missions may provide experience and technologies related to off-Earth human outposts and operations, asteroid mining would provide experience almost exclusively with robotic, deep space missions. This creates little reduction in operational risk for human Mars missions, limiting the benefits to cost reduction. The evaluation was done using publicly available information regarding existing companies and technologies. This has limitations, especially in evaluating the potential ROI of each resource, given that the details from most business plans are not publicly available. It was assumed that business plans were sound and reasonable (high potential ROI) when companies had received private investment and have announced the development of a certain capability in the short-term (less than 5 years). It was assumed that proposed price points were achievable (medium potential ROI) when companies had announced the particular capability as their ultimate goals and had received investment for them. In all other cases, it was assumed that there was a low potential ROI (no evidence of credible business plan or price point). Regarding cost reductions for Mars, NASA's Design Reference Architecture 5.0 [9] was used as a reference of the capabilities needed. As for the Moon, the reference was the recent Evolvable Lunar Architecture study [10]. As for the market sizes, the following considerations were done: Hardware for prospecting spacecraft and instrument packages can be spun off for Earth observation, as Planetary Resources is
doing with their Ceres constellation [11]. The Earth observation market is an existing $2B per year market that is expected to grow to about $6B per year in 2022 [12]. Propellant has many uses in cislunar space, the main two being satellite refueling for station keeping, and space tug refueling for LEO to GEO (geostationary orbit) transfers. Considering current yearly launches to GEO and the average mass per satellite, the propellant needed for LEO to GEO transfers would amount to about $1.8B per year. Both the number of launches and the average mass per satellite are expected to grow in the following years [13]. Supply depots would be a key element of the propellant resupply market, and are therefore considered to have a similar market size to that of propellant. For ferrous metals and semiconductors, the annual Earth-side manufacturing market for the components that could be manufactured (structures, antennas, reaction wheels, solar panels), amounts to about $3.6B annually [14], [15]. It could be assumed that the manufacturing market off-Earth could take up a considerable fraction of that amount, but it is not clear how long it would take since the capability is available for the satellite manufacturers to exploit it. The market for spare parts could be around $150M per year [16] and would be available before endto-end satellite manufacturing. PGMs have a high enough price to consider returning them to Earth. PGMs have experienced a market deficit for the past years, where mining supply could not cover demand and suppliers had to reduce their stocks. This helped stop the descent in the prices, and is expected to continue in the following years [8]. Asteroid-derived PGMs could cover the market deficit without risking overloading the market. Assuming the estimate from Jollie [8] of an annual deficit of 250,000 oz. for platinum, and selling as well the other derived PGMs, the total market could amount to $730M at today's prices. Finally, the telecommunications market in space is well established and was about $120B annually in 2014 (just services) [14]. It is assumed that any technologies developed for deep space communications could find an application within that market, or could be derived from it.
Table 2 shows the result of the evaluation of all the capabilities presented above according to the scheme presented in Table 1. The most noticeable result of the evaluation is the low maturity of the industry and lack of companies interested in developing these capabilities. Table 3 shows the list of companies that were found to
Table 1 Evaluation scheme for potential ACOTS capabilities. Criteria
Description
Industry maturity/capability Readiness or maturity level of industry capability to perform successfully in an operational space environment Viable companies
Significant market
Positive ROI
Cost reduction for Moon
Cost reduction for Mars
Number of viable companies that exemplify strong financial and technical capabilities and ability to raise significant investment funds for proposed capability demonstration Measure of potential for emergence of near-term markets (<5 years) beyond NASA's needs to enable cost sharing and cost-effective pricing. Measure of potential for positive return on investment (ROI) includes level of affordability to fully develop capability, proposed price point for capability, and overall business plan to achieve ROI Measure of potential to reduce cost for capability that may be critical for a Moon architecture Measure of potential to reduce cost for capability that may be critical for a Mars architecture
Hi/Med/Lo definition High - TRL 6 or above Med - TRL 4 or 5 Low - TRL 3 and below High - 3 or more Med - 1 or 2 Low - 0 High - Over $500M markets in next 5 years Med - $100M - $500M markets in next 5 years Low - Emergence of markets in over 5 years High - proposed business plans are sound and reasonable Med - proposed price points are achievable Low - no evidence of credible business plan or price point High e more than 80% likelihood that capability will reduce cost Med - 40% - 80% likelihood Low e less than 40% likelihood High e more than 80% likelihood that capability will reduce cost Med - 40% - 80% likelihood Low e less than 40% likelihood
Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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Table 2 Evaluation of potential ACOTs capabilities. Capability Phase I Prospecting spacecraft Instrument packages Processes: propellant Processes: consumables Processes: ferrous metals Processes: semiconductors Processes: PGMs Phase Communications II Production: propellant Production: consumables Production: ferrous metals Production: semiconductors Production: PGMs Manufacturing: structures and parts Manufacturing: solar panels Storage depots
Industry maturity/ capability
Viable companies
Significant market
Positive ROI
Cost reduction for Moon
Cost reduction for Mars
High High Low Low Low Low Low High Low Low Low Low Low Low
Med High Med Med Med Med Med High Med Med Med Med Med Med
High High High Low Med Low High High High Low Med Low High Med
High High Med Low Med Low Med High Med Low Med Low Med Med
Low Low High Med Low Low Low High High Med Low Low Low Low
Med Low High High High High Low Med High High High High Low High
Low High
Med High
Low High
Low Med
Low High
High High
have an interest in any of the ACOTS capabilities as part of their business plans. This list covers most capabilities, but it not meant to be exhaustive and other companies might be available. For most capabilities, only 1 or 2 companies are interested, and the technology readiness level (TRL) is almost always low. It is also interesting how only propellant has any influence on Moon mission architectures, where it would definitely be cheaper to acquire the other resources form the Moon's surface itself. However, for Mars missions, spare parts, and on-orbit manufacturing and assembly techniques would create cost reduction opportunities using most of the asteroid resources. Finally, for many of the markets there is a huge uncertainty in the return on investment, with no clear price points or business cases. Further work would need to look in more detail into the technical feasibility of these markets, and better define the business cases. 5. Proposed ACOTS After evaluating the possible capabilities, the potential ACOTS program can be outlined. From the evaluation in Table 2, it is clear that the production of PGMs and semiconductors should be left out of the program, given the low market expectations or the low interest for Moon and Mars missions. Other capabilities, such as instrumentation or communications, could be left out due to the high maturity of the industry and the high market expectations, which could allow the industry to develop everything on their own. This would mean that a potential ACOTS program would have to wait for the industry to have demonstrated remote sensing instrumentation on their own, but two companies expect to do exactly that in 2017 [17,18]. The final outline of the ACOTS program would be: 5.1. Objectives 1. Demonstrate and enter into operation asteroid prospecting and mining capabilities. 2. Demonstrate and enter into operation cislunar orbital capabilities. 3. Reduce life-cycle costs to Mars and Moon settlement mission concepts.
5.2. Implementation phases
Objectives: 1. Demonstrate capabilities for autonomous operations in deep space and near asteroids. 2. Prospect target asteroids for presence of water and ferrous metals. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for cost-effective resource extraction in target asteroids. Capabilities: 1. Prospecting spacecraft: deep space probes with NEA rendezvous capabilities. 2. Processes: extraction, beneficiation, and production in milli/ microgravity environment of: a. Propellant b. Structural (ferrous) metals Phase II: Asteroid resource extraction demonstration Objectives: 1. Demonstrate capabilities for scaled-up resource extraction and delivery to cislunar space. 2. Demonstrate feasibility and scalability of resource processing in cislunar space. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for propellant and resource storage in cislunar space. Capabilities: 1. Industrial production: scaled up production and storage in cislunar space of: a. Propellant b. Structural (ferrous) metals 2. Manufacturing: structures and spare parts. 3. Storage depots: storage of propellant and other materials in cislunar space. Phase III: Asteroid resources delivery services. Objectives: 1. NASA awards long-term contract for delivery of processed resources to cislunar space. 2. Awards are made to different providers.
Phase I: Resource assessment Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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Table 3 Companies potentially involved in ACOTS. Company
Product of market planned
Deep Space Industries Planetary Resources ULA Shackleton Energy Made in Space ACME Advanced Materials Altius Space Machines Honeybee robotics
End-to-end asteroid mining and manufacturing End-to-end asteroid mining, Earth observation Cislunar depots and space tugs Cislunar depots for lunar propellant Space-based manufacturing Microgravity manufacturing (for Earth applications) Cryogenic refueling and capture robotics Asteroid mining equipment
With this outline, the ACOTS program would spur the development of industrial activities in cislunar space by making asteroid resources easily available. It would as well provide cost reductions for Moon activities, with on-orbit propellant that would not need to be taken up from the Moon's gravity well, and for Mars missions, with on-orbit propellant and on-orbit assembly and manufacturing possibilities. The availability of on-orbit propellant and manufacturing would also allow other industries to appear in full force, such as satellite servicing, space tugs, and space-based solar power. In general, making asteroid resources available would enable many other industries in the cislunar economy, as well reduce cost for human exploration efforts of the Moon and Mars. 6. Asteroid first or Moon first? The proposed ACOTS program presents an important question: should an ACOTS program be implemented in preference of the LCOTS program? Both programs can be compared in terms of their industry maturity and potential long-term benefits, in order to define the solution. In terms of maturity, it is obvious that the LCOTS program from Zuniga et al. [1] is more attainable for the industry than the proposed ACOTS. The competitors of the Google Lunar XPrize program and NASA's CATALYST are in a much better position to start work on the first phase of the LCOTS program than any of the companies considered in this paper for ACOTS. We also have a better knowledge of the resource distribution on the Moon, thanks to a number of prospecting missions in the early 2000s. In this regard, it could be more reasonable to implement an LCOTS program first, and develop capabilities on the Moon before moving onto asteroids. In terms of long-term benefits, LCOTS has the potential to provide more experience, and operational and technical heritage for Mars missions. It also leads to the establishment of a permanent human presence on the Moon, creating the first human outpost outside of Earth. The ACOTS program would not lead to a permanent human outpost, but asteroid-derived resources could be cheaper than those extracted from the Moon, not only in terms of propellant, but also regarding abundance and availability. The ACOTS program would have then greater benefits to the cislunar economy as a whole, by providing cheap, accessible in-space resources, which would eventually benefit both Mars and the Moon. The discussion comes down then to what the final goal is. If the goal is to just get humans to Mars, then the Moon's propellant might be the best way to do it quicker. If the goal is to provide a source of space-based resources, then asteroids provide the most abundant and accessible source. However, if the goal is to expand affordable human access to space in general, the best choice would be to pursue both targets. Asteroids can provide in-space resources for a new cislunar economy and to reduce cost of lunar and Mars
missions, but the Moon would provide an easy target for human exploration, and experience for Mars operations. This would bring meaning to human activities on space by giving them a short-term goal, while developing an infrastructure to support permanent presence and expansion of humans away from Earth. 7. Conclusions A potential ACOTS program, developed using the model of the LCOTS program and based on best practices from the COTS program, could spur the creation of a vibrant cislunar economy by providing in-space resources for on-orbit refueling, servicing, and manufacturing, while providing cost reductions for human missions to the Moon and Mars. The asteroid mining effort would have many synergies with the proposed LCOTS program, which could be exploited to reduce costs or to create more competition in the new market. Developing both ACOTS and LCOTS program simultaneously could result in the creation of a space infrastructure that could support permanent human presence in space and human expansion beyond the cislunar system. Funding This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. References [1] A.F. Zuniga, D. Rasky, R.B. Pittman, E. Zapata, R. Lepsch, Lunar COTS: an economical and sustainable approach to reaching Mars, in: Presented at the AIAA Space, 2015. [2] S. Siceloff, Commercial Crew Program - the Essentials, NASA, 25-Feb-2016 [Online]. Available, http://www.nasa.gov/content/commercial-crew-programthe-essentials (Accessed 06 April 2016). [3] J.S. Lewis, Asteroid Mining 101, Deep Space Industries, 2015. [4] Deep Space Industries, Asteroid Mining, 2016 [Online]. Available, https:// deepspaceindustries.com/mining/ (Accessed 23 June 2016). [5] Planetary Resources, Asteroids, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. planetaryresources.com/asteroids/#asteroids-intro (Accessed 23 June 2016). [6] SpaceX, SpaceX Capabilities & Services, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. spacex.com/about/capabilities (Accessed 23 March 2016). [7] International Platinum Group Metals Association, 25 Prominent and Promising Applications Using Platinum Group Metals, 2012. [8] D. Jollie, Forecasting Platinum Supply and Demand, Jan. 2016. Glaux Metal. [9] NASA, Human Exploration of Mars Design Reference Architecture 5.0, NASA, Jul. 2009. [10] C. Miller, A. Wilhite, D. Cheuvront, R. Kelso, H. McCurdy, E. Zapata, Economic Assessment and Systems Analysis of an Evolvable Lunar Architecture that Leverages Commercial Space Capabilities and Pubic-Private Partnerships, Jul. 2015. NexGen Space LLC. [11] Planetary Resources, Earth Observation, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. planetaryresources.com/earth-observation/#eo-intro (Accessed 27 March 2016). [12] Northern Sky Research, Satellite-based Earth Observation (EO), fifth ed., Oct. 2013. [13] FAA Commercial Space Transportation (AST), 2015 Commercial Space Transportation Forecast, Apr. 2015. [14] The Tauri Group, State of the Satellite Industry Report, Sep-2015. [15] L. Sarsfield, The Cosmos on a Shoestring, RAND Technologies, 1998. [16] J. Kreisel, On-Orbit servicing of satellites (OOS): its potential market & impact, in: Proceedings of 7th ESA Workshop on Advanced Space Technologies for Robotics and Automation ‘ASTRA, 2002. [17] Deep Space Industries, Technology, Deep Space Industries, 2016 [Online]. Available, https://deepspaceindustries.com/technology/ (Accessed 27 March 2016). [18] Planetary Resources, Technology, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. planetaryresources.com/technology/#space-based-observation (Accessed 24 June 2016).
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Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships Carlos M. Entrena Utrilla Callejon del Angel 12 4E, 18006 Granada, Spain
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a b s t r a c t
Article history: Received 10 February 2017 Accepted 12 March 2017 Available online xxx
NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program showed the potential of privatepublic partnerships (PPPs) to reduce cost of access to space, producing two launch vehicles and cargo capsules in record time and with a factor 20 cost reduction. This program was followed by the Commercial Crew Program (CCP), aiming to provide affordable human access to space, which should end in 2017 with the first flight of a commercial crew capsule. The same team that created COTS is now proposing the Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services (LCOTS) program, with the goal of developing cislunar capabilities, establish a human outpost on the Moon, and reduce cost and risk for future Mars missions. Private-public partnerships seem to be becoming NASA's tool of choice to develop affordable human access to space, increase capabilities, and incentivize the private space sector for a much lower cost than previous approaches. This paper wants to expand the use of the COTS-like programs by developing a concept of a COTS program for asteroid mining, simply referred to as Asteroid-COTS, or ACOTS for short. The paper uses the same methodology of the proposed LCOTS program, proposing a phased-development approach and evaluating which capabilities should be included in the program with a similar scheme. The result is a high-level ACOTS proposal with several synergies with the LCOTS program, and which could lead to the creation of a cislunar infrastructure to support permanent human presence in space. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Asteroid mining Private-public partnerships Commercial space New space
1. Introduction The Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program has been one of the most successful NASA programs of the last decade, yielding two commercial resupply vehicles and adding two new launchers to the US fleet in a much shorter time than NASA alone could, with a cost reduction of 20 to 1 [1]. These two vehicles now routinely resupply the ISS with both pressurized and unpressurized cargo, and one of the launchers, the Falcon 9, has established a strong presence in the global commercial launch market and is revolutionizing the launch industry with lower launch costs and reusability efforts. The successor of the COTS program, the Commercial Crew Program (CCP), is funding the development of two commercial crew vehicles for a much lower cost and shorter time than NASA's own efforts with Orion and SLS [2]. Both vehicles are expected to fly their demonstration missions in 2017, thus ending the American reliance on Russia to take crew to
the ISS that was created with the retirement of the Shuttle in 2011. The success of these programs shows the potential for privatepublic partnerships (PPPs) to reduce cost and risk in space activities, enabling affordable human access to space, and expanding the economic sphere of humanity into low Earth orbit (LEO). In order to expand humanity's economic sphere even further, the Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services (LCOTS) program is being proposed by the same team that created COTS. This program aims to demonstrate and enter into operation cislunar capabilities, while reducing risks and life-cycle costs for Mars missions [1]. The ideal output of the LCOTS program is an array of commercial companies that can provide affordable access to the Moon's surface, and deliver its resources (namely, propellant) to cislunar space for other space applications. When the LCOTS program is complete, Earth's economic sphere will include the Moon and its riches. However, the Moon is not the only possible source for space resources. Asteroids, in particular near-Earth asteroids (NEAs), can provide an alternative source for propellant and other materials, sometimes at lower cost. There are an expected 4000 NEAs that require less propellant (delta-V) per trip than the Moon's surface,
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Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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Abbreviations CCP COTS GEO ISS LCOTS LEO NEA PGM PPP ROI TRL
Commercial Crew Program Commercial Orbital Transportation Services Geostationary International Space Station Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services Low Earth Orbit Near-Earth Asteroid Platinum Group Metal Private-Public Partnership Return on Investment Technology Readiness Level
and the lack of differentiation creates higher mineral concentrations than any terrestrial or lunar deposits for certain elements [3]. This implies that NEAs are necessarily a part of the cislunar economy, and may compete with the Moon in the market for propellant and other materials. It is then interesting to ask whether or not a COTS-like program for asteroid mining would be beneficial for the industry and NASA, and how it can compete or collaborate with the LCOTS program. This paper aims to follow the methodology of the LCOTS proposal by Zuniga et al. [1] to study a possible Asteroid COTS-like (ACOTS) program, its relevance for the current state of the industry, and its relationship with the LCOTS program and the development of the cislunar economy as a whole.
2. The LCOTS program The Lunar Commercial Orbital Transfer Services program was published first in 2015 by the same team that created the COTS program [1]. The goal is to develop a new strategy that leverages the US commercial space industry and entrepreneurial attributes to allow a return to the Moon within NASA's budgets, based on best practices from the COTS program. The idea is to take advantage of lunar resources for Mars exploration, without NASA having to incur in all the costs of developing the capabilities. The LCOTS proposal has three main objectives: 1. Demonstrate and enter into operation cis-lunar capabilities; 2. Reduce technical and operational risk to Mars mission concepts 3. Reduce life-cycle costs to Mars architectures. With these goals in mind, LCOTS proposes a phased development that allows incremental development and demonstration of capabilities, going in line with the COTS practice of providing several off-ramps for NASA and guaranteeing time between phases to evaluate progress. The three-phase program starts with resource prospecting and demonstration of landing capabilities, and ends with NASA contracts with several providers for the delivery of propellant to a cislunar station. The three phases can be summarized as follows: Phase I: demonstrate presence of and access to the desired resources, and extraction capabilities. Phase II: demonstrate capability to process resources, scalability, and delivery. Phase III: award of long-term contracts. These phases can be similarly applied to the development of an ACOTS program, since they essentially comply with all the COTS
best practices. In order to do this, the first step is to determine which asteroid resources are of interest for Mars and Moon missions, and for the cislunar economy. Then the objectives of the program will be set, and these will determine the potential capabilities to develop. These will then be evaluated following a similar scheme to that of Zuniga et al. [1], determining which capabilities should be left for the industry alone and which should NASA include in ACOTS. Final result is a high-level outline of a possible ACOTS program, which can be compared with the LCOTS program to find synergies, common ground, and to determine how they could be implemented best. 3. Asteroid resources Interest in asteroid mining has grown in recent years, with companies such as Deep Space Industries and Planetary Resources aiming to mine NEAs for propellant and other resources [4], [5]. NEAs contain most of the resources needed for space activities, from volatiles and water to structural metals and semiconductors, and most of them are, unlike planetary bodies, undifferentiated, that is, they present a more or less uniform composition with no core, mantle, and crust, which allows much higher concentrations of scarce metals than what can be found on Earth or the Moon. This, along with the fact that an expected 4000 NEAs require less propellant (delta-V) to access than the Moon's surface, makes them a very interesting target for mining resources for use in space, and in some cases return to Earth [3]. In the context of supporting missions to Mars and the Moon, and providing resources for the emerging cislunar economy, there are four kind of asteroid resources that are most interesting in the short term: water, ferrous metals, semiconductor metals, and platinum group metals (PGMs). These four resources will drive the selection of the capabilities for any potential ACOTS program: Water can be used as propellant, either as monopropellant in electric or solar thermal thrusters, or as bipropellant in the form of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. It can also be used for human consumption, either on its own or as a source of oxygen, and for radiation shielding purposes. It is estimated that between 50% and 60% of the NEA-mass could be water-rich carbonaceous asteroids [3]. Given the current cost of launch to orbit (about 1700 $/kg to LEO with SpaceX Falcon Heavy [6]), and considering that propellant is always the largest part of the mass of spacecraft, water could be the resource from asteroids that creates the largest cost reductions. Ferrous metals are widely abundant in the asteroid population (about 25%), making them ideal for the fabrication of structures, which require the greatest quantities of material. They could be used to manufacture structures for satellites and stations, and spare parts for on-orbit servicing. Manufacturing in space would allow for structures that do not have to withstand the stress of launch, permitting new configurations and designs, as well as structures too big to fit within a launcher's fairing [3]. Since most Mars and Moon architectures require assembly of assets in orbit [1], the availability of structural materials from asteroids would allow for larger spacecraft and stations. Semiconductors can be used for the production of solar panels, and potentially other electronics. Solar panels are essential for all the current space operations, based on solar power, and manufacturing them in space would reduce the necessary launch mass of all missions. This could enable markets that currently require too much launched mass to be affordable, such as space-based solar power, either for Earth or the Moon. Asteroid-derived solar panels would also be easier to deploy on the Moon's surface than those manufactured on Earth. Some
Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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asteroids might be up to 7% elemental silicon, requiring little processing for extraction [3]. Platinum group metals (PGMs) are amongst the most valuable metals on Earth, with plenty of applications in modern industry [7]. The value of PGMs make them one of the few asteroidderived resources that could be brought back to Earth for a profit. Moreover, PGMs have been experiencing a market deficit for the past years, with mining production not being able to cover all the demand. This is expected to continue for the following years [8], increasing the prices and possibly enabling PGMs as a source of income for asteroid mining. Asteroids can provide an abundant supply of other resources, such as carbon, nitrogen, or calcium compounds, but will only be useful once the space economy is sufficiently developed to provide economically interesting uses for them. Others, such as titanium or aluminium, also exist in asteroids, but their relative abundances and the energy requirements of their extraction make them less appealing in their typical uses (structural alloys), than ferrous metals [3]. 4. Defining Asteroid-COTS As explained before, this paper applies the methodology exposed by Zuniga et al. for the LCOTS proposal [1] to study a potential ACOTS program. This methodology defines first the objectives and phases of the program, and then evaluates the capabilities that could be developed by the industry under a COTS-like program. The same process will be followed here. 4.1. Program objectives Following the spirit of LCOTS, the ultimate goal of the ACOTS program would be to reduce cost and risk for human exploration missions, either to the Moon or Mars. The resources available on asteroids could allow on-orbit refueling and manufacturing schemes that could induce reductions in cost these missions, but they could also stimulate the creation of new space-based markets such as satellite servicing, retrofitting, and repair. With this in mind, the proposed ACOTS program would have the following objectives: 1. Demonstrate and enter into operation asteroid prospecting and mining capabilities. 2. Demonstrate and enter into operation cislunar orbital capabilities. 3. Reduce life-cycle costs to Mars and Moon settlement mission concepts. These objectives align with the interests of the LCOTS program for cislunar orbital capabilities and cost reduction of Mars missions, while providing possible cost reductions for LCOTS itself. This synergy could be exploited by finding common capabilities between LCOTS and ACOTS to avoid redundancies, for example in the use of cislunar depots. Notice that the objectives do not make explicit reference to any particular kind of asteroid resource. This is intentional, and allows freedom when defining the capabilities to include only those resources that would be most interesting for a COTS-like program. 4.2. Possible development phases and capabilities These objectives could be accomplished in three phases with the same structure of the LCOTS program: assessment of resources, demonstration of resource extraction capabilities, and long-term
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contracts for material delivery services. The main differences appear in the technical implementation: while for the Moon several landers and rovers would be delivered to different places to obtain ground truth and prospect for resources, for asteroids several missions would have to be deployed to the different types of asteroids, in order to determine their exact composition and structure, and establish the most interesting targets. So while LCOTS focuses its initial stages on landing and rover capabilities, ACOTS would focus on deep space operations, and milli/microgravity mining techniques. The implementation of the LCOTS phases would be the following: Phase I: Resource assessment 1. Demonstrate capabilities for autonomous operations in deep space and near asteroids. 2. Prospect target asteroids for presence of resources. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for cost-effective resource extraction in target asteroids. Phase II: Asteroid resource extraction demonstration 1. Demonstrate capabilities for scaled-up resource extraction and delivery to cislunar space. 2. Demonstrate feasibility and scalability of resource processing in cislunar space. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for propellant and resource storage in cislunar space. Phase III: Asteroid resources delivery services. 1. NASA awards long-term contract for delivery of processed resources to cislunar space. 2. Awards are made to different providers. These phases provide, as in the LCOTS proposal, incremental development and several off-ramps and opportunities for evaluating progress. With these phases as a framework, the next step is to study the capabilities that are feasible for the industry to develop given its current maturity. For phases I and II, there are a number of high-level capabilities that could be included in the program. Phase I: Resource assessment 1. Prospecting spacecraft: deep space probes with NEA rendezvous capabilities. 2. Instrument packages: remote sensing instruments to determine composition of asteroids. 3. Processes: extraction, beneficiation, and production in milli/ microgravity environment of: a. Propellant b. Consumables (atmosphere, water) c. Structural (ferrous) metals d. Semiconductor metals e. PGMs Phase II: Asteroid resource extraction demonstration 1. Communications capability: communications network for large scale, deep space operations without reliance on NASA's Deep Space Network. 2. Industrial production: scaled up production and storage in cislunar space of: a. Propellant b. Consumables (atmosphere, water) c. Structural (ferrous) metals d. Semiconductor metals
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e. PGMs 3. Manufacturing: use of metals and semiconductors for: a. Structures and spare parts. b. Solar panels. 4. Storage depots: storage of propellant and other materials in cislunar space.
4.3. Evaluation of the potential capabilities The potential capabilities were evaluated with an evaluation scheme similar to the one used for LCOTS in Ref. [1], considering the maturity of the industry, the possibility of other markets outside of NASA, and their contribution for cost reduction for Mars and Moon missions. The evaluation scheme is shown in Table 1. The modification from the LCOTS evaluation scheme is the inclusion of the cost reduction possibilities for Moon missions, and only evaluating cost reduction for Mars missions, instead of overall risk reduction. This is justified because, while Moon missions may provide experience and technologies related to off-Earth human outposts and operations, asteroid mining would provide experience almost exclusively with robotic, deep space missions. This creates little reduction in operational risk for human Mars missions, limiting the benefits to cost reduction. The evaluation was done using publicly available information regarding existing companies and technologies. This has limitations, especially in evaluating the potential ROI of each resource, given that the details from most business plans are not publicly available. It was assumed that business plans were sound and reasonable (high potential ROI) when companies had received private investment and have announced the development of a certain capability in the short-term (less than 5 years). It was assumed that proposed price points were achievable (medium potential ROI) when companies had announced the particular capability as their ultimate goals and had received investment for them. In all other cases, it was assumed that there was a low potential ROI (no evidence of credible business plan or price point). Regarding cost reductions for Mars, NASA's Design Reference Architecture 5.0 [9] was used as a reference of the capabilities needed. As for the Moon, the reference was the recent Evolvable Lunar Architecture study [10]. As for the market sizes, the following considerations were done: Hardware for prospecting spacecraft and instrument packages can be spun off for Earth observation, as Planetary Resources is
doing with their Ceres constellation [11]. The Earth observation market is an existing $2B per year market that is expected to grow to about $6B per year in 2022 [12]. Propellant has many uses in cislunar space, the main two being satellite refueling for station keeping, and space tug refueling for LEO to GEO (geostationary orbit) transfers. Considering current yearly launches to GEO and the average mass per satellite, the propellant needed for LEO to GEO transfers would amount to about $1.8B per year. Both the number of launches and the average mass per satellite are expected to grow in the following years [13]. Supply depots would be a key element of the propellant resupply market, and are therefore considered to have a similar market size to that of propellant. For ferrous metals and semiconductors, the annual Earth-side manufacturing market for the components that could be manufactured (structures, antennas, reaction wheels, solar panels), amounts to about $3.6B annually [14], [15]. It could be assumed that the manufacturing market off-Earth could take up a considerable fraction of that amount, but it is not clear how long it would take since the capability is available for the satellite manufacturers to exploit it. The market for spare parts could be around $150M per year [16] and would be available before endto-end satellite manufacturing. PGMs have a high enough price to consider returning them to Earth. PGMs have experienced a market deficit for the past years, where mining supply could not cover demand and suppliers had to reduce their stocks. This helped stop the descent in the prices, and is expected to continue in the following years [8]. Asteroid-derived PGMs could cover the market deficit without risking overloading the market. Assuming the estimate from Jollie [8] of an annual deficit of 250,000 oz. for platinum, and selling as well the other derived PGMs, the total market could amount to $730M at today's prices. Finally, the telecommunications market in space is well established and was about $120B annually in 2014 (just services) [14]. It is assumed that any technologies developed for deep space communications could find an application within that market, or could be derived from it.
Table 2 shows the result of the evaluation of all the capabilities presented above according to the scheme presented in Table 1. The most noticeable result of the evaluation is the low maturity of the industry and lack of companies interested in developing these capabilities. Table 3 shows the list of companies that were found to
Table 1 Evaluation scheme for potential ACOTS capabilities. Criteria
Description
Industry maturity/capability Readiness or maturity level of industry capability to perform successfully in an operational space environment Viable companies
Significant market
Positive ROI
Cost reduction for Moon
Cost reduction for Mars
Number of viable companies that exemplify strong financial and technical capabilities and ability to raise significant investment funds for proposed capability demonstration Measure of potential for emergence of near-term markets (<5 years) beyond NASA's needs to enable cost sharing and cost-effective pricing. Measure of potential for positive return on investment (ROI) includes level of affordability to fully develop capability, proposed price point for capability, and overall business plan to achieve ROI Measure of potential to reduce cost for capability that may be critical for a Moon architecture Measure of potential to reduce cost for capability that may be critical for a Mars architecture
Hi/Med/Lo definition High - TRL 6 or above Med - TRL 4 or 5 Low - TRL 3 and below High - 3 or more Med - 1 or 2 Low - 0 High - Over $500M markets in next 5 years Med - $100M - $500M markets in next 5 years Low - Emergence of markets in over 5 years High - proposed business plans are sound and reasonable Med - proposed price points are achievable Low - no evidence of credible business plan or price point High e more than 80% likelihood that capability will reduce cost Med - 40% - 80% likelihood Low e less than 40% likelihood High e more than 80% likelihood that capability will reduce cost Med - 40% - 80% likelihood Low e less than 40% likelihood
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Table 2 Evaluation of potential ACOTs capabilities. Capability Phase I Prospecting spacecraft Instrument packages Processes: propellant Processes: consumables Processes: ferrous metals Processes: semiconductors Processes: PGMs Phase Communications II Production: propellant Production: consumables Production: ferrous metals Production: semiconductors Production: PGMs Manufacturing: structures and parts Manufacturing: solar panels Storage depots
Industry maturity/ capability
Viable companies
Significant market
Positive ROI
Cost reduction for Moon
Cost reduction for Mars
High High Low Low Low Low Low High Low Low Low Low Low Low
Med High Med Med Med Med Med High Med Med Med Med Med Med
High High High Low Med Low High High High Low Med Low High Med
High High Med Low Med Low Med High Med Low Med Low Med Med
Low Low High Med Low Low Low High High Med Low Low Low Low
Med Low High High High High Low Med High High High High Low High
Low High
Med High
Low High
Low Med
Low High
High High
have an interest in any of the ACOTS capabilities as part of their business plans. This list covers most capabilities, but it not meant to be exhaustive and other companies might be available. For most capabilities, only 1 or 2 companies are interested, and the technology readiness level (TRL) is almost always low. It is also interesting how only propellant has any influence on Moon mission architectures, where it would definitely be cheaper to acquire the other resources form the Moon's surface itself. However, for Mars missions, spare parts, and on-orbit manufacturing and assembly techniques would create cost reduction opportunities using most of the asteroid resources. Finally, for many of the markets there is a huge uncertainty in the return on investment, with no clear price points or business cases. Further work would need to look in more detail into the technical feasibility of these markets, and better define the business cases. 5. Proposed ACOTS After evaluating the possible capabilities, the potential ACOTS program can be outlined. From the evaluation in Table 2, it is clear that the production of PGMs and semiconductors should be left out of the program, given the low market expectations or the low interest for Moon and Mars missions. Other capabilities, such as instrumentation or communications, could be left out due to the high maturity of the industry and the high market expectations, which could allow the industry to develop everything on their own. This would mean that a potential ACOTS program would have to wait for the industry to have demonstrated remote sensing instrumentation on their own, but two companies expect to do exactly that in 2017 [17,18]. The final outline of the ACOTS program would be: 5.1. Objectives 1. Demonstrate and enter into operation asteroid prospecting and mining capabilities. 2. Demonstrate and enter into operation cislunar orbital capabilities. 3. Reduce life-cycle costs to Mars and Moon settlement mission concepts.
5.2. Implementation phases
Objectives: 1. Demonstrate capabilities for autonomous operations in deep space and near asteroids. 2. Prospect target asteroids for presence of water and ferrous metals. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for cost-effective resource extraction in target asteroids. Capabilities: 1. Prospecting spacecraft: deep space probes with NEA rendezvous capabilities. 2. Processes: extraction, beneficiation, and production in milli/ microgravity environment of: a. Propellant b. Structural (ferrous) metals Phase II: Asteroid resource extraction demonstration Objectives: 1. Demonstrate capabilities for scaled-up resource extraction and delivery to cislunar space. 2. Demonstrate feasibility and scalability of resource processing in cislunar space. 3. Demonstrate capabilities for propellant and resource storage in cislunar space. Capabilities: 1. Industrial production: scaled up production and storage in cislunar space of: a. Propellant b. Structural (ferrous) metals 2. Manufacturing: structures and spare parts. 3. Storage depots: storage of propellant and other materials in cislunar space. Phase III: Asteroid resources delivery services. Objectives: 1. NASA awards long-term contract for delivery of processed resources to cislunar space. 2. Awards are made to different providers.
Phase I: Resource assessment Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001
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Table 3 Companies potentially involved in ACOTS. Company
Product of market planned
Deep Space Industries Planetary Resources ULA Shackleton Energy Made in Space ACME Advanced Materials Altius Space Machines Honeybee robotics
End-to-end asteroid mining and manufacturing End-to-end asteroid mining, Earth observation Cislunar depots and space tugs Cislunar depots for lunar propellant Space-based manufacturing Microgravity manufacturing (for Earth applications) Cryogenic refueling and capture robotics Asteroid mining equipment
With this outline, the ACOTS program would spur the development of industrial activities in cislunar space by making asteroid resources easily available. It would as well provide cost reductions for Moon activities, with on-orbit propellant that would not need to be taken up from the Moon's gravity well, and for Mars missions, with on-orbit propellant and on-orbit assembly and manufacturing possibilities. The availability of on-orbit propellant and manufacturing would also allow other industries to appear in full force, such as satellite servicing, space tugs, and space-based solar power. In general, making asteroid resources available would enable many other industries in the cislunar economy, as well reduce cost for human exploration efforts of the Moon and Mars. 6. Asteroid first or Moon first? The proposed ACOTS program presents an important question: should an ACOTS program be implemented in preference of the LCOTS program? Both programs can be compared in terms of their industry maturity and potential long-term benefits, in order to define the solution. In terms of maturity, it is obvious that the LCOTS program from Zuniga et al. [1] is more attainable for the industry than the proposed ACOTS. The competitors of the Google Lunar XPrize program and NASA's CATALYST are in a much better position to start work on the first phase of the LCOTS program than any of the companies considered in this paper for ACOTS. We also have a better knowledge of the resource distribution on the Moon, thanks to a number of prospecting missions in the early 2000s. In this regard, it could be more reasonable to implement an LCOTS program first, and develop capabilities on the Moon before moving onto asteroids. In terms of long-term benefits, LCOTS has the potential to provide more experience, and operational and technical heritage for Mars missions. It also leads to the establishment of a permanent human presence on the Moon, creating the first human outpost outside of Earth. The ACOTS program would not lead to a permanent human outpost, but asteroid-derived resources could be cheaper than those extracted from the Moon, not only in terms of propellant, but also regarding abundance and availability. The ACOTS program would have then greater benefits to the cislunar economy as a whole, by providing cheap, accessible in-space resources, which would eventually benefit both Mars and the Moon. The discussion comes down then to what the final goal is. If the goal is to just get humans to Mars, then the Moon's propellant might be the best way to do it quicker. If the goal is to provide a source of space-based resources, then asteroids provide the most abundant and accessible source. However, if the goal is to expand affordable human access to space in general, the best choice would be to pursue both targets. Asteroids can provide in-space resources for a new cislunar economy and to reduce cost of lunar and Mars
missions, but the Moon would provide an easy target for human exploration, and experience for Mars operations. This would bring meaning to human activities on space by giving them a short-term goal, while developing an infrastructure to support permanent presence and expansion of humans away from Earth. 7. Conclusions A potential ACOTS program, developed using the model of the LCOTS program and based on best practices from the COTS program, could spur the creation of a vibrant cislunar economy by providing in-space resources for on-orbit refueling, servicing, and manufacturing, while providing cost reductions for human missions to the Moon and Mars. The asteroid mining effort would have many synergies with the proposed LCOTS program, which could be exploited to reduce costs or to create more competition in the new market. Developing both ACOTS and LCOTS program simultaneously could result in the creation of a space infrastructure that could support permanent human presence in space and human expansion beyond the cislunar system. Funding This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. References [1] A.F. Zuniga, D. Rasky, R.B. Pittman, E. Zapata, R. Lepsch, Lunar COTS: an economical and sustainable approach to reaching Mars, in: Presented at the AIAA Space, 2015. [2] S. Siceloff, Commercial Crew Program - the Essentials, NASA, 25-Feb-2016 [Online]. Available, http://www.nasa.gov/content/commercial-crew-programthe-essentials (Accessed 06 April 2016). [3] J.S. Lewis, Asteroid Mining 101, Deep Space Industries, 2015. [4] Deep Space Industries, Asteroid Mining, 2016 [Online]. Available, https:// deepspaceindustries.com/mining/ (Accessed 23 June 2016). [5] Planetary Resources, Asteroids, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. planetaryresources.com/asteroids/#asteroids-intro (Accessed 23 June 2016). [6] SpaceX, SpaceX Capabilities & Services, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. spacex.com/about/capabilities (Accessed 23 March 2016). [7] International Platinum Group Metals Association, 25 Prominent and Promising Applications Using Platinum Group Metals, 2012. [8] D. Jollie, Forecasting Platinum Supply and Demand, Jan. 2016. Glaux Metal. [9] NASA, Human Exploration of Mars Design Reference Architecture 5.0, NASA, Jul. 2009. [10] C. Miller, A. Wilhite, D. Cheuvront, R. Kelso, H. McCurdy, E. Zapata, Economic Assessment and Systems Analysis of an Evolvable Lunar Architecture that Leverages Commercial Space Capabilities and Pubic-Private Partnerships, Jul. 2015. NexGen Space LLC. [11] Planetary Resources, Earth Observation, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. planetaryresources.com/earth-observation/#eo-intro (Accessed 27 March 2016). [12] Northern Sky Research, Satellite-based Earth Observation (EO), fifth ed., Oct. 2013. [13] FAA Commercial Space Transportation (AST), 2015 Commercial Space Transportation Forecast, Apr. 2015. [14] The Tauri Group, State of the Satellite Industry Report, Sep-2015. [15] L. Sarsfield, The Cosmos on a Shoestring, RAND Technologies, 1998. [16] J. Kreisel, On-Orbit servicing of satellites (OOS): its potential market & impact, in: Proceedings of 7th ESA Workshop on Advanced Space Technologies for Robotics and Automation ‘ASTRA, 2002. [17] Deep Space Industries, Technology, Deep Space Industries, 2016 [Online]. Available, https://deepspaceindustries.com/technology/ (Accessed 27 March 2016). [18] Planetary Resources, Technology, 2016 [Online]. Available, http://www. planetaryresources.com/technology/#space-based-observation (Accessed 24 June 2016).
Please cite this article in press as: C.M. Entrena Utrilla, Asteroid-COTS: Developing the cislunar economy with private-public partnerships, Space Policy (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.spacepol.2017.03.001