The UN permit office established under the 2102 Permit Bill began accepting applications in late December 2102, seated simultaneously at two locations: Luna, for claims within the inner solar system, and Ceres, for claims in the belt and beyond. The dual seating was deliberate — a single Luna-based office would have forced belt-based applicants to route filings across months of transit lag, at the moment the office was trying to bring the current backlog of unregistered operators into formal compliance.
Filing Requirements
Applications must be filed in person. No remote or proxy filing option exists, and none is planned. Officials cited the need to verify identity, capital documentation, and fleet registration directly — a standard that will slow processing for distant applicants but was described as non-negotiable given the volume of unregistered and semi-registered claims the Bill is attempting to formalize.
The published documentation requirements:
- Company profile — full ownership and identity disclosure, including business license for any Earth-based entity
- Estimated capital — proof of funds, verified directly by office staff
- Workforce and manpower list — full roster of personnel
- Fleet registry — complete vessel listing; Kuzmin Drive-equipped vessels “explicitly encouraged” though not yet mandated
- Projected area of operation — defined claim area for conflict review
- Security force disclosure — full accounting of armed personnel or security assets
- Licensed pilot roster — all flight personnel must hold a valid UN spacecraft piloting permit; the permit course and examination remain Luna-only, adding significant lead time for applicants without already-licensed pilots
The Backlog
Office administrators declined to give a firm processing timeline but confirmed the office is not yet running at full capacity and does not expect to be for some months. Informal belt-trade estimates put the backlog of pre-Bill independent operators at several hundred. Incomplete applications will not be held in queue.
The in-person filing requirement, Luna-only pilot permits, and the office’s sub-capacity operational state together form the operational context for the permit regime that Dr. Ingrid Lieke’s 2102 supply-shock model had treated as a variable it could not yet quantify: whether permit administration was functioning as a neutral processing gate or an active policy instrument depended, in part, on how the office actually worked.