The Space Economy is now in the order of $400B per annum, expanding at >10% p.a. Thousands of new commercial satellites are planned for launch over the next decade, and these will require fuel for stationkeeping and end-of-life disposal. In-space refuelling is a major developing demand. To address this launch demand, there are at present something like 150 new small satellite launcher designs under development. There is also an imminent dramatic improvement in space access becoming available via the decision of SpaceX to market scheduled launch services for smallsat rideshares on their Falcon 9 rockets, in which they will launch on scheduled dates whether their manifest is full or not.
CITATION: Sonter, M, 2019. Space Mining: why, what, where (and when), in Proceedings Future Mining 2019, pp 189191 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).