Slashdot Mirror
FAA Could Extend Property Rights On the Moon Through Regulation
MarkWhittington writes When the Outer Space Treaty which, among other things, forbade claims of national sovereignty on other worlds, was signed and ratified by the United States in 1967, little thought was given to the idea of private property rights. Now, with companies like Moon Express and Bigelow Aerospace contemplating private lunar operations, that question has become a concern. According to Reuters, the FAA may have discovered a way to enforce private property rights on the moon without, it is hoped, violating the Outer Space Treaty. The idea is to extend the FAA's current launch licensing authority to cover commercial activities on the moon. The agency would license, for example, a helium 3 mining facility, giving the company running it control over it and as much adjoining territory as necessary to run the operation. The size of that territory, for which a particular company would hold property and mineral rights, could be considerable.
I wasn't aware the US owned the Moon or the rights to it...
If you live in the US, you're already used to this...
That's an incredibly ignorant comment. The Outer Space Treaty fairly explicitly recognizes the right for a nation to enforce the property and activity rights of its citizens in space. It's one of the primary reasons for the treaty existing at all. The FAA isn't saying Americans will own parts of the moon. It is saying that if I spend a billion dollars to build a mining company up there, it's not going to let someone else mine in the exact same place while my operations are actively going on, since it might damage my investment up there and discourage further exploration or development. And once I've pulled up stakes, anyone can move in there.
It's a pretty damn sensible approach, actually.