This episode of RIP Corp is about Planetary Resources — a company formed to "expand Earth's natural resource base" through asteroid mining — and its ... not quite failure to launch, but failure to conquer the final frontier. It’s also about how their brief, ill-fated trajectory has seemingly only strengthened the resolve of people working to make space mining a reality.
Please check out all the books (past and forthcoming) about space stuff (also past and forthcoming) authored by contributors to this episode: Space Settlements by Fred Scharmen | Rare Earth Frontiers by Dr. Julie Michelle Klinger | Asteroids: How Love, Fear, and Greed Will Determine Our Future in Space by Dr. Martin Elvis. Plus, follow Atossa Araxia Abrahamian's newsletter Terra Nullius.
RIP Corp is a Charts & Leisure production. Find us at ripcorp.biz, or follow us @ripcorpdotbiz on Twitter and Instagram, for all your dead business needs.
RIP Corp is written and hosted by Ingrid Burrington, with research and fact-checking from Matt Giles. Produced by Meghal Janardan and Mike Rugnetta. Original music and sound design from Andrew Atkin and Michael Simonelli. Design and illustration by Beatriz Lozano and Megan Mulholland. Executive produced by Jason Oberholtzer.