Glossary

What "space mining" legally means today

This dataset distinguishes national authorization acts, resource-ownership laws, and international treaty obligations. Its authorization tracker is independent research.

• The treaty baseline. Under the Outer Space Treaty, no country may make the Moon or any other celestial body its own, whether by claiming it, using or occupying it, or any other means (Article II). Article VI assigns states responsibility for national space activities and requires authorization and continuing supervision of non-governmental activities by the "appropriate State Party to the Treaty". The treaty wording does not define that responsibility simply by an operator's home country. (Outer Space Treaty (1967), Article VI quotation in the reviewed record)
• Who has authorized resource activity. Japan has granted two permissions under its 2021 Space Resources Act, both to ispace, for Mission 1 (2022) and Mission 2 (2024). Luxembourg granted one authorization under its 2017 law to ispace Europe, for the Tenacious rover (2024). The U.S. case documented in this dataset is Moon Express's 2016 FAA-led payload review, which was not a resource permit. (Japan Space Resources Act permit to ispace for HAKUTO-R Mission 1 (2022), Japan Space Resources Act permit to ispace for Mission 2 (RESILIENCE) (2024), Luxembourg space resources mission authorisation to ispace EUROPE S.A. for the TENACIOUS micro-rover (2024), FAA-led interagency payload review: Moon Express MX-1E (2016))
• Ownership of what is extracted. The U.S. (2015) and Japanese (2021) laws say operators may own the resources they extract, and Luxembourg's 2017 law says space resources can be owned. The United Arab Emirates replaced its 2019 space law with a 2023 decree-law that keeps a permit system for resource activities; a law firm's summary of its 2023 space resources regulation says operators may own what they extract, but this dataset has not seen the regulation's text. These laws deal with ownership of extracted material, not of territory. (U.S. Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act of 2015, Title IV (Space Resource Exploration and Utilization Act of 2015), Luxembourg Law of 20 July 2017 on the exploration and use of space resources, Japan: Act on the Promotion of Business Activities Related to the Exploration and Development of Space Resources (Act No. 83 of 2021), UAE Federal Law No. 12 of 2019 on the Regulation of the Space Sector (space resources provisions))
• International positions. The Artemis Accords, with 76 signatories as of 25 September 2026, affirm that extracting space resources does not, by itself, count as the national appropriation that Article II of the Outer Space Treaty forbids. The Moon Agreement, with 17 parties as of 25 September 2026, instead declares the Moon and its natural resources the "common heritage of mankind", and applies the same rules to the other bodies of the solar system besides Earth. (Artemis Accords (2020), Moon Agreement (1979))
• Work in progress at the UN. A UN working group (COPUOS Legal Subcommittee) circulated a consolidated draft of non-binding principles, prepared by its chair and vice-chair, in July 2026; nothing has been adopted, and finalization is targeted for 2027. (UN COPUOS Legal Subcommittee Working Group on Legal Aspects of Space Resource Activities (draft initial recommended principles))
• What this dataset documents. The two ispace missions associated with the three resource-specific authorizations in this dataset ended in failed landings. As of the 26 September 2026 review, the reviewed dataset contains no confirmed commercial resource delivery. This is a bounded research finding, not proof of global absence. Scientific sample collection and resource-processing demonstrations have occurred.

The word the regulator uses matters: Japan grants a permission (許可, rendered "license" in the government's English translation), Luxembourg an authorization (agrément), and the U.S. act recorded here is a favorable payload determination.

Activity ladder (never interchangeable)

The dataset records how far along the ladder an organization or mission has actually gone, based on primary evidence, not on what it says it will do.

1. Claimed resource — the resource an organization says it intends to use or sell. A claim alone moves nothing up the ladder.
2. Remote detection — a resource inferred from orbit or from Earth (for example, water signatures in lunar polar craters).
3. Prospecting — measurements on or near the body meant to locate and characterize a resource (drills, neutron spectrometers, mass spectrometers, rovers).
4. Sample collection or return — material gathered and analyzed in place or brought to Earth, mainly for science. Government sample-return missions are recorded here, not as mining.
5. Extraction demonstration — a small-scale test that separates a usable product from local material on another body (for example, producing oxygen from the Martian atmosphere).
6. Commercial extraction — recovering a resource at a scale and on terms meant for sale or operational use. No commercial delivery in this dataset. A claim of commercial extraction stays unpublished until a separate evidence review accepts it. Holding the claim back is not proof that the claim is false.

Terms

• Space resources — the legal term used in national statutes and at the United Nations for abiotic material found in outer space, including water and minerals. "Space mining" is the everyday term for activities aimed at recovering them.
• ISRU (in-situ resource utilization) — using material found at the destination (regolith, ice, atmosphere) instead of launching it from Earth: making oxygen, water, propellant, metals, or building material.
• Regolith — the loose layer of dust, broken rock, and soil covering the Moon, asteroids, and Mars.
• Water ice (lunar polar) — ice believed to be trapped in permanently shadowed craters near the lunar poles; the most discussed near-term lunar resource because it can supply drinking water, oxygen, and rocket propellant.
• Helium-3 — a rare, light helium isotope implanted in lunar regolith by the solar wind. Proposed uses include cryogenic cooling for quantum computers and, speculatively, fusion fuel.
• Platinum-group metals (PGMs) — platinum, palladium, rhodium, ruthenium, iridium, and osmium; the main stated target of metal-asteroid prospecting companies.
• Near-Earth asteroid (NEA) — an asteroid whose orbit brings it close to Earth's; the bodies most asteroid-resource companies target because they are the easiest to reach.
• Lander / rover / payload — a lander delivers hardware to a surface; a rover moves on it; a payload is an instrument or package carried by someone else's spacecraft. A payload's operator and the lander's operator are recorded separately.
• Mission authorization — a government's permission for a company or person under its jurisdiction (for example, one registered or operating in its territory) to conduct a specific space activity. It is how a state, as the "appropriate State Party", meets its treaty duty to authorize and supervise non-governmental space activity.
• Space resources permit — a mission authorization issued under a national law written specifically for resource activities (for example Japan's and Luxembourg's).
• Payload review — a U.S. interagency review, led by the FAA, of a payload that is not otherwise licensed. A favorable determination is not a mining license.
• Government purchase contract — a government agreement to buy a resource or sample from a company (for example NASA's 2020 lunar regolith purchase contracts; the reviewed dataset does not document completed purchases as of 26 September 2026). Recorded as a contract event, not an authorization: it makes the government a customer, not a regulator.

How status words are used

• Announced — the organization has said it will do it. Nothing more.
• Manifested — a primary record shows it booked on a specific launch or lander.
• Launched / landed — it happened, per mission or agency records.
• Lost / failed / partial success — recorded using the operator's own post-mission statement.
• Achieved — used only for a result the primary record confirms.