Glasgow-based Asteroid Mining Corporation (AMC) has announced plans for the UK’s first space-mining mission, which aims to extract and process materials from asteroids.

The company, founded by entrepreneur Mitch Hunter-Scullion, is working alongside academic partners to develop the Asteroid Prospecting Satellite One (APS1) with the goal of identifying platinum-group metals deposits on near-Earth asteroids.

AMC has received support from Business Gateway and plans to build the APS1 in Glasgow at a cost of £2.3 million, creating seven jobs.

Mr Hunter-Scullion and his team have calculated that a single metallic asteroid 25m in diameter would contain about 29 tonnes of platinum, worth around £725 million.

AMC (www.asteroidminingcorporation.co.uk) aims to unlock this economic potential in 2020 by launching APS1 to conduct a spectral scan of near-Earth asteroids in order to determine which contain the highest concentrations of platinum and will be viable candidates for mining.

He said: “Our goal is to develop ground-breaking technology that will eventually enable the extraction, processing and use of materials derived from the many millions of asteroids known to exist near Earth.

“The APS1 will be a spectroscope space telescope that will gather data on target asteroids and will act as a test bed for some of our technologies, which we will scale up later for actual mining missions.

“Our crowdfunding campaign is now up and running, and we’re confident we can attract sufficient investment.”

AMC is working with the International Institute of Air and Space Law at Leiden University to draft a proposal for a UK Space Resources Activities bill.

“This bill will allow the UK to become a major global player in the rapidly growing space-mining sector — and the third country, after the USA and Luxembourg, to develop such forward-thinking legislation.

“Our vision is that other similar businesses will relocate to the UK and we will develop a thriving industry, making us a global hub for space resource activities.”