Ice mining is the process of removing ice ore from ice fields, which were introduced with the Exodus patch. Ice fields are similar to asteroid belts, but instead of containing asteroids they contain ice ore which you can only mine by using a Mining Barge fitted with Ice Harvesters. Ice belts are dotted around empire and 0.0 space. Ice found in 0.0 has more variations in the types of ore it refines to, but is rarer.