On Tuesday, Planetary Resources announced its plan to mine Near-Earth Asteroids (NEAs), paving the way for mankind's reach beyond the Earth. This would include mining for raw minerals, ranging from water to precious metals such as gold and platinum.
But we should not be interested in gold so much as in platinum, and platinum not so much as a precious metal, but as a catalyst.
I was wondering if it were possible or likely that you could mine the main asteroid belt for these metals. You could use Ceres as a base for fuel. You could begin near Earth, go to Ceres, then to the other asteroids for mining, then bring back the metals at the end of the trip.
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