MIT Professor Advocates Ending Asteroid Redirect Mission To Fund Asteroid Survey

MarkWhittington writes Professor Richard Binzel published a commentary in the journal Nature that called for two things. He proposed that NASA cancel the Asteroid Redirect Mission currently planned for the early 2020s. Instead, he would like the asteroid survey mandated by the George E. Brown, Jr. Near-Earth Object Survey Act of 2005, part of the 2005 NASA Authorization Act, funded at $200 million a year. Currently NASA funds the survey at $20 million a year, considered inadequate to complete the identification of 90 percent of hazardous near-Earth objects 140 meters or greater by 2020 as mandated by the law.

Comments

Congress

[dkman]

... inadequate to complete the identification of 90 percent of hazardous near-Earth objects 140 meters or greater by 2020 as mandated by the law.

This is the problem with Congress. How the hell do you make a law saying you need to identify 90% of something we can't validate at all? Who's going to say when you reach 90%? If we get clobbered by a rock it's clearly part of the 10% we didn't know, gee sorry.

Re:But where are the potentional profits?

[Anonymous Coward]

"There IS profit to be made on mining asteroids."

That's absolutely ludicrous. Go find out the spot price for mineral ore that's available by the tons right here on Earth.

Tell me how you intend to make a *profit* by going into space with massive amounts of technology and resources???

To get the same things we already have here?