At least 14 space agencies have identified ‘in situ resource utilization’ as a necessary capability for long-duration missions, including crewed missions to the Moon, Mars and deep space. Attention is focused on the potential production of rocket fuel from ice and water-bearing minerals. If fuel can be sourced in space, it will not need to be lifted, at great expense, from Earth’s surface. But while the mining of asteroids and other celestial bodies offers benefits, it will also create risks. Mining that is motivated purely by resource extraction could overlook or even destroy important scientific information, while physical interactions with an asteroid could alter its trajectory and, in some circumstances, potentially create a human-caused Earth impact risk. There are presently two competing efforts to develop widely agreed rules on space mining. The first is an industry-friendly effort in which the United States is engaging in bilateral negotiations with dozens of states, encouraging them to sign the non-binding Artemis Accords. The second is a multilateral effort that fully considers the interests of non-spacefaring states and is taking place in the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space.

Some 66 billion years ago, a cataclysmic collision between the Earth and an asteroid ten to 15 kilometres in diameter caused the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs. In 1908, an asteroid 50 to 70 metres in diameter levelled over 2,000 square kilometres of forest in Siberia, while in 2013 an asteroid 19 metres in diameter produced a shockwave over Chelyabinsk, Russia, sending over a thousand people to the hospital. The field of ‘planetary defence’ involves the detection, characterisation, risk assessment and, if necessary, deflection of asteroids and comets that have the potential to strike Earth. Yet there has been a lack of high-level diplomacy on this issue. In particular, the low probability of a major Earth impact happening in our lifetime makes planetary defence a low priority for political leaders, despite the existential consequences of impacts and their eventual certainty of occurring. There is also a shortage of widely agreed international law, including on the potential use of nuclear explosive devices for deflecting asteroids. Most importantly, there is a lack of agreement on who is responsible for vetting the science, assessing the risks and making decisions if Earth were faced with an actual impact threat. Is it the United Nations Security Council that decides? What if a Security Council decision is blocked by one of its veto-holding permanent members? Would a state that acted unilaterally be excused any illegality because of the necessity of its actions, according to the international law on ‘state responsibility’?