• Canada Now Willing to Punish Crimes Committed on the Moon
    https://gizmodo.com/canada-crimes-committed-on-the-moon-1848859299

    More than 50 years ago, Apollo astronauts left 96 bags of their own waste on the surface of the Moon. But they didn’t exactly fear getting hit with a fine for littering, as space—the Moon included—has been a largely lawless region. Canadian law makers are hoping to change that.

    Canada amended its criminal code on Thursday to allow for the prosecution of crimes committed by Canadian astronauts during trips to the Moon or on the lunar surface itself. Foreign astronauts who threaten the life or security of a Canadian astronaut can also be punished by Canadian law, according to broadcaster CBC.

    Canada’s criminal code had already included crimes committed by its astronauts aboard the International Space Station as punishable by law. But the recent amendment now accounts for the Canadian Space Agency’s participation in the upcoming Artemis program, through which NASA intends on sending people back to the Moon’s surface later this decade, and possibly as early as 2025.

    The Artemis 2 mission, in which a crewed Orion capsule will travel to the Moon and back without landing, will include a Canadian astronaut. Canada is also contributing a robotic arm to the Lunar Gateway, a planned outpost in orbit around the Moon. The European Space Agency, as well as Japan’s Aerospace Exploration Agency, are also taking part in the Artemis program.

    As these international collaborations take shape in the midst of an evolving industry, it has become more crucial to reconsider the laws currently in place when it comes to governing space. As it stands, space is loosely governed by the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which was penned in light of the space race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The treaty hasn’t been updated since, and article six of the Outer Space Treaty states that nations will supervise the activities of their citizens in space.

    #Espace #Communs #Loi #Traité_espace

  • NASA will pay for moon rocks excavated by private companies | MIT Technology Review
    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/09/10/1008310/nasa-pay-moon-rocks-lunar-samples-excavated-private-companies/?truid=a497ecb44646822921c70e7e051f7f1a

    Any commercial mission that can prove it has collected lunar samples stands to make up to $25,000.
    by

    Neel V. Patel

    NASA announced today that it was seeking proposals from private companies interested in collecting samples from the moon and making them available for purchase by the agency.

    The news: As part of the new initiative, one or more companies will launch a mission to the moon and collect between 50 and 500 grams of lunar regolith from the surface. If they can store the sample in a proper container and send pictures and data to NASA to prove the sample has been collected and can be brought to Earth safely, NASA will pay that company between $15,000 and $25,000.

    The company would receive 10% of its payment after its bid is selected by NASA, 10% after the mission launches, and the remaining 80% upon delivering the materials to NASA. The agency has yet to determine exactly how it will retrieve the sample, but the exchange would be expected to happen “in place” on the moon itself—meaning any participating company is only obligated to figure out how to get to the moon. NASA would retain sole ownership of the material upon transfer.

    NEWS: @NASA is buying lunar soil from a commercial provider! It’s time to establish the regulatory certainty to extract and trade space resources. More: https://t.co/B1F5bS6pEy pic.twitter.com/oWuGHnB8ev
    — Jim Bridenstine (@JimBridenstine) September 10, 2020

    The samples could be from anywhere on the surface of the moon, and could possess any rock, dust, or ice materials. The agency wants to complete these exchanges before 2024.

    What’s in it for NASA: There’s an extremely high demand for lunar material among scientists. Nearly all the lunar material currently in NASA’s possession was collected during the Apollo program. While the initiative itself will only bring a small amount to Earth compared with the hundreds of kilograms gathered during Apollo, this could be the first step in establishing a new pipeline for lunar samples, in which NASA buys from the private sector instead of devoting resources to building and launching missions for that purpose.

    In a blog post published today, NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine said the new initiative is part of the agency’s larger goal with the Artemis program to bolster private-sector participation in space exploration. The agency is already working with several launch providers under its Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program to deliver nearly two dozen scientific and technological payloads to the moon in the run-up to a crewed landing by the end of 2024. The 2024 landing itself is slated to utilize hardware built by private companies, most notably the lunar lander for taking humans to the surface.
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    What’s in it for the company: $25,000 is paltry compensation for such a mission, so any companies that participate won’t be in this for money. Instead, it’s an incentive to test out new technologies, including those that could be later used to extract resources like water ice from the moon. The mission outlined in today’s announcement will only involve collecting and storing material from the surface, but that’s still something no private company has done before.

    Legal questions: Lastly, many of America’s larger lunar ambitions focus on establishing a moon mining industry and developing a marketplace that allows excavated resources to be bought and sold by different parties. Bridenstine alludes to these plans in his blog post, referencing President Trump’s April 2020 executive order that encourages the recovery and use of resources in outer space. That order was a follow-up to a law passed in 2015 outlining America’s position that US companies are allowed to own and sell resources they’ve extracted from extraterrestrial bodies. There’s still debate as to whether such policies conflict with the 1967 UN Outer Space Treaty.

    #Lune #Communs #Enclosure #Traité_espace #NASA