NASA is set to launch a new mission, ELSA-d, to remove decades-old space junk from Earth’s orbit using a lightweight version of the International Space Station’s robotic arm. The mission aims to capture some of the millions of pieces of orbital debris that float above Earth. The US Space Force is also working on a clean-up mission, with debris from a Russian anti-satellite weapons test adding urgency to international and government efforts to get rid of high-flying trash.
As part of its Clean Space initiative, ESA plans to tackle the problem directly by designing dedicated removal missions. Additionally, NASA should prioritize destroying non-trackable and other small debris, as remediating smaller debris is not as effective. In an effort to clean up space, NASA is seeking solutions from innovators across the globe.
Innovators at NASA Johnson Space Center have designed an Active Debris Removal Vehicle (ADRV) that can remove large orbital debris from low-Earth orbit (LEO). Astronomers laud NASA’s plan to protect the space environment, but the agency needs to act fast to make a difference. NASA is funding the development of AI space lasers to protect its spacecraft and astronauts from potentially deadly space junk.
ClearSpace-1 will be the first space mission to remove an item of debris from orbit, planned for launch in 2025. The US Space Force is also working on a document outlining which parts of the U.S. government are responsible for studying ways to clean.
📹 Check Out How Scientists Are Planning to Clean Up Space Junk
From shooting nets and attaching electromagnetic tethers, to building data infrastructures, find out all the creative ways we’re …
How long will space junk last?
Space junk, resulting from collisions or anti-satellite tests, can create thousands of new debris. While rare, countries like the USA, China, and India have used missiles to blow up their own satellites, creating dangerous debris. The main threat to space exploration is to other satellites in orbit, who must move out of the way of the incoming space junk to avoid damage or destruction. Currently, space junk poses minimal risk to space exploration efforts.
How does NASA get rid of space junk?
NASA has developed a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis of debris clean-up methods, focusing on the economic risks imposed on satellite operators. The analysis includes a model that outlines the economic risks space debris imposes on operators, based on the time it takes to match the cost of clean-up and the method of cleanup used. The report applies the model to two scenarios: prioritizing large debris breakdown and debris removal, which involves removing the top 50 largest and most-concerning objects in space, and targeting small debris removal, which involves eliminating 100, 000 pieces of debris from 1-10 cm in size.
The report aims to help industries understand how to effectively implement new technologies and address the economic risks associated with debris in space. The analysis provides a better understanding of how to implement new technologies effectively.
How much junk is left in space?
Around 2, 000 active satellites orbit Earth, but 3, 000 dead ones are also littering space. Around 34, 000 pieces of space junk, larger than 10 centimetres in size, and millions of smaller pieces could pose a threat if they hit something else. Thousands of dead satellites and tens of thousands of fragments of space debris are currently orbiting Earth. During beta testing, articles can only be saved for seven days.
Will all space junk eventually fall to Earth?
Space debris poses a significant risk to astronauts, especially during extra-vehicular activities on the International Space Station (ISS). While suits can protect astronauts from small particles, most of the ISS has shields to protect them from objects up to one cm in diameter. To protect astronauts from larger objects, the ISS must navigate out of the way or use the auxiliary Soyuz spacecraft as a “lifeboat”. Whipple shields are used on the ISS to protect against particles up to about 3 mm in size.
These multi-layered shields break up the impacting object into smaller fragments until they are too small to penetrate the last layer. However, shields must be larger and spaced too far apart to protect against bigger objects, making them insufficient for protecting everything that cannot be tracked. NASA can address this issue by navigating out of the way or using the auxiliary Soyuz spacecraft as a “lifeboat”.
What is the 25 year rule for satellites?
The European Space Agency (ESA) has reduced the maximum time spent in protected low-Earth orbits at the end of life for new missions from 25 years to five years. The maximum time spent in these orbits is now five years. As space activity increases and debris in orbit increases, collision alerts are also increasing. Improved collision avoidance strategies, including automation, space traffic coordination, and new communication protocols, are needed to reduce collision risks. Satellite health monitoring and robust passivation techniques are also needed to prevent satellites from breaking up from within.
Can space junk damage Earth?
As of May 2022, Earth has over five thousand satellites orbiting it, posing numerous opportunities for dismantling, getting lost in space, and emitting debris that could be harmful to both outer space and the planet. At least three thousand satellites remain inactive and are not being retrieved by the programs that sent them out to explore. If one of these inactive satellites hits one of the thousands of other pieces of space junk orbiting the planet, it could result in a catastrophic disaster, such as an uncontrollable emission of toxic substances towards the planet.
Even if not all space junk is left to float in space or threaten Earth, it can hinder the chances of those searching for scientific answers. For example, a significant amount of space junk has been left on the moon, making it difficult to set up camp and implement new technologies for advanced missions and exploration.
One of the main problems with space junk sent into the atmosphere is the distance it is sent, as many satellites sent over 22, 000 miles into the atmosphere make retrieving and bringing it back to Earth more difficult, resulting in even more space junk.
Is space junk a threat to Earth?
Space junk poses environmental dangers by releasing compositional chemicals during re-entry into the atmosphere, weakening ozone and threatening space exploration and future generations. The Kessler Syndrome, also known as the Kessler Effect, is a domino effect scenario where larger objects create collisions, causing more debris and destruction until nothing remains in orbit. The probability of two 10cm or larger objects crashing is low, but the 2009 collision between an operating satellite and a non-functional satellite led to more debris circling Earth. Therefore, faster space junk removal efforts are needed to mitigate these environmental risks.
Is anything being done about space junk?
The European Space Agency (ESA) has developed a space claw called ClearSpace-1, set to launch in 2025, to remove inactive satellites from orbit. The removal process could also be done using magnets. Japan-based orbital debris removal company Astroscle has developed Elsa-D, a system consisting of two spacecraft that work together to latch onto and capture debris stuck in orbit. The successful demonstration of Elsa-D on August 25th, 2021, helps combat the challenge of docking with or capturing the object in orbit.
How many dead satellites are in space?
The United States launched Vanguard I into a medium Earth orbit in 1958, making it the oldest surviving artificial space object still in orbit. As of October 2009, it and the upper stage of Vanguard 1’s launch rocket are the oldest surviving artificial space objects still in orbit. As of May 2022, the Union of Concerned Scientists listed 5, 465 operational satellites from a known population of 27, 000 pieces of orbital debris tracked by NORAD.
Satellites are sometimes left in orbit when they are no longer useful, and many countries require passivation at the end of their life. Properly moved satellites have an eight-percent probability of puncture and coolant release over a 50-year period, creating more debris.
Despite passivation, many satellites and rocket bodies have exploded or broken apart on orbit. In 2015, the USAF Defense Meteorological Satellite Program Flight 13 exploded, creating at least 149 debris objects, which were expected to remain in orbit for decades. NOAA-16 broke apart in 2014, and design flaws in older programs, such as the Soviet-era Meteor 2 and Kosmos satellites, resulted in numerous break-ups, resulting in more debris.
Is it possible to recycle space junk?
The debris flux in Earth-orbiting rings could outnumber natural meteoroid flux, posing a threat to future spacecraft designs. Recycling waste can be beneficial, as it can be used to build future spacecraft or exploration outposts, such as a base on the moon. This minimizes the need for a launch and reduces space debris. Satellite recycling can also provide raw materials for space construction and revenue to fund it. Advanced cameras have been built in space, and new satellites could be deployed on Gateway Earth to monitor asteroids that could collide with the planet.
While recycling is still uncommon in space, scientists are building the groundwork for a future where space recycling is possible. By 2030, the European Space Agency (ESA) aims to create a debris-free zone by 2030, using existing Space Debris Mitigation Requirements objects in low Earth orbit. They also aim to establish a “circular economy” in space, ensuring long-term orbital sustainability through in-orbit servicing by 2050.
NASA’s Orbital Syngas Commodity Augmentation Reactor (OSCAR) payload was deployed to the edge of space in 2019, funding a study on waste conversion technologies. Researchers looked into methods to convert trash and human waste into valuable gases like methane, hydrogen, and carbon dioxide in a synthetic gas blend. OSCAR would allow safe waste disposal by venting reclaimed garbage in the form of an inert gas from a spacecraft, and may enable astronauts to recover useful resources from the waste, such as fuel, metals, and water.
Who is cleaning up space junk?
NASA is seeking innovative solutions to detect, track, and clean up small space debris in low Earth orbit (LEO). As humanity’s presence in space has expanded, so has the number of objects orbiting Earth. Currently, there are millions of tiny objects between 1 millimeter and 10 centimeters in LEO, which can travel at high speeds and pose potential risks to current and future spacecraft. The United States Space Surveillance Network currently tracks larger debris, but does not currently track and monitor small objects.
A more robust, scalable system is needed to successfully detect, track, and remediate small space debris. The challenge encourages the public to think creatively and consider technologies and processes that may have the potential for significant impact. Participants can submit a proposed solution to one of three challenge categories to win part of the $120, 000 prize purse.
📹 Space is Full of Junk. Here’s How to Clean It Up…
We know pollution is a problem on earth, but we’re filling space with our junk too. And if we don’t figure out a way to clean up …
Automated Drones, and targeted descent. Like swarms of mini drones with the capability to slow down stuff. They’ll likely be tiny and made of plastic, automated and in the thousands to millions of them launched in large rockets. Kinda like Tesla’s starlink but with an order of magnitude more. They’d have very limited thrust potential but they would be guided by ai and attach/bash into or jettison to the nearest space debris to destabilize the orbit and bring the junk down eventually burning up upon re-entry.
For anyone interested in this topic, there’s a hard sci-fi TV series from the 2000s called Planetes that’s about a future where cleaning up space debris has become necessary due to increased space travel. Of course, in that series, the clean up is largely done by hand, in order for human drama to happen, but it’s otherwise technically-accurate and was produced in collaboration with space agencies.
I don’t like the idea of a one-time use space junk collector. I would think it would be expensive and wasteful. Keeping that claw design for larger debris is good but if the satellite had some propulsion to both push the debris down to earth and redirect the satellite to another piece of debris. Then with its last remaining propusion, use that to push itself to earth. This might save resources and money.
At 10:35 for a moment you looked like Judge Doom, who framed Roger Rabbit. 😀 Back on topic, I don’t recall this being addressed in the article but once the claw has a hold of some space debris, what does it do with it? Is the claw designed for repeated use or would they have to send out a new claw for every object that needs cleaning up? That’s going to be a whole lot of pieces…
I like how everything in the first 5min is shown and explained as if the debris is static around earth and not flying at thousands of kilometers because if it was static, it would fall to earth. Have fun trying to catch a walnut sized metal object flying at hundreds and thousands of kilometers an hours.
Robot with claw arms = STUPID IDEA It can only grab junk of a very specific size. If it’s too big or too small in any direction it totally won’t work. Then we’ll have even more space junk up there as they bundle though other junk grabbing ideas. It’s this is what we’re relying on, humanity is doomed. 😔
I feel like small, articulated, solar-powered ion-thrusters that could attach themselves to a piece of debris, gradually halt any rotation by thrusting opposite the direction of rotation, then thrust in the opposite direction of travel to gradually bleed of inertia, would be a great way to do this. You could launch many on a single mission, use the ion-thrusters to navigate to the object, then attach themselves via any of a number possible means (magnetic, self-curing epoxy, straps, etc.) You’d basically be turning any selected object into a solar-powered spacecraft with tiny-but-sustained thrust. The other idea I had would be essentially a semi-rigid “space parachute,” tuned to create drag by either reflecting sunlight or to scoop up occasional air molecule present at those altitudes (or both). The air option would also gradually accumulate air molecules inside the “scoop” of the parachute, too, increasing the mass of the object (by a miniscule amount, but still).
The Clear Space claw robot may help to recover large intact objects and that is good. There needs to be (an even harder to do) solution to eliminate high energy small objects as well. One thing is certain, if we fail to clean it all up we could experience a cascading shower of space debris as a number of collisions begins a chain reaction and we all could end up going back to the 1960’s with respect to communications and navigation. This is a critically important task that must be done right and it is not at all trivial to accomplish. This whole thing reminds me the the Sourcerer’s Apprentice, who started into action systems that he could not control. Humans have done the same thing in almost every aspect of the modern world, including human made satelites and space exploration.
#1 you need to bump push junk into low orbit to burn up #2 Then you need a Large fuel tank to refuel it to do more work it simply cant float about without air fuels to maneuver other objects #3 dodge incoming junk 1 hit your out action also use to bump satelites back into higher orbit 10 yrs more life
Seems like this approach is essential a really expensive BandAid. Won’t the effort to match orbits with the junk mean that this will only work for old, large satellites launched prior to life-cycle rules and those large newer satellites that malfunction in deorbiting? This won’t work for cheap cube sats, sat debris, or accidents once that orbital shell gets highly populated. I think you’ll need space sponges instead. Large, low density bodies into which debris collides where the energy of collision evaporates the sponge, leaving the debris in close orbit with the sponge. You use the sponges to create specific lanes in orbit, cleaning a path like a street sweeper.
Kessler syndrome doesn’t get nearly enough attention in pop culture, so I’m very happy for this article! Starlink and similar 1000+ satellite swarm projects get me very concerned. Now that private launch systems are becoming so available, we definitely need more international rules to keep space safe for mankind against dangerous private exploitation.
If I’m remembering right, this fun little scenario has a name. The Kessler syndrome. Also, I could swear I remember a Sci-Fi book I read a long time ago that had a orbital debris cleanup satellite that used some sort of net and once the net got full it would fling it back to Earth to burn up, possibly being preloaded with several
I wrote a paper on this problem last year and I mentioned a unique way to remove junk without the issue of making contact with the dead satellite. Hanspeter Schaub and his team have been developing a craft that uses electrostatic attraction to slowly drag the satellites out of the way. It’s like a rudimentary tractor beam. Idk if it’ll work but I thought it was a cool idea.
I might have missed it but what if the claws are already grabbed onto the debris? Will it burn it? Attq g a mini rocket and drive it out of the orbit? Use its components to repair the space stations 😅 take it apart and recycle it somehow? Melt and compress parts so it could work as an ingredient for later? Or if it can match the spin and tempo of the debris it could redirect it toward the planet? Ir bring it back means literally turn and land to earth with the object? This latter sounds unsustainable to me.
5:28 Hey Joe you said you don’t need to say miles because you’re using SI units, and while yes that’s true if this is an academic paper or something, this isn’t just science. It’s science communication. Much of your audience is American, we’re gonna have a much better idea of what some number means if you put it in the US system on screen as well. And plenty of Canadians use the US system, while lots of brits still use the actual imperial system which is still pretty close.
Planetes, an animation from 2003, is exactly about this topic of space debris. As a problem that has been known for so long, it is unfortunate that more solutions haven’t been tried over the years. As always, these problems seem to be pushed into a corner until it cannot be avoided. The money making aspect of satellites seem so short sighted and yet more than 8300 are now orbiting this earth with the USA responsible for over 2900. In this regard, USA should be at the forefront of developing solutions for space debris and reusing damaged satellites. Hope this happens in my lifetime …
Since I’m poor and the world defence institutions would absolutely never agree this is a pipe dream. Build a new space station in geostationary, make it have a state of the art materials net, and a high power solar array to fuel lasers to alter the trajectory of debris and catch it on the next revolution. Space station doesn’t move. And uses light to accelerate and decelerate large enough objects.
This is actually very comical. Taking on the much smaller task of cleaning up floating debris in the oceans can’t even be accomplished. To put this into perspective, cleaning up the oceans is a two dimensional task involving 71% of the surface of the planet. (thus, 140 million square miles) In space, it is an all encompassing zone around the planet, with objects in a three dimensional area from a couple 100 miles above, to over 20,000 miles above the surface. You are talking about a total space volume of about 7 TRILLION CUBIC MILES! There is no way we can make a perceivable reduction in an area of that size, with rocket deployed recovery mechanisms.
4:25 – Incorrect terminology. Being “slightly higher up” doesn’t mean “weaker gravity” which makes it stay in space longer. Even at the highest LEO (2000 km) mentioned in this article, gravity is still over 60% of what you would feel at the Earth’s surface. It’s that when you’re higher, the atmosphere is thinner, which reduces drag. You covered this point literally a few seconds earlier!
What is the point of this whole article ? – The crucial question was not even lightly touched upon. – So you grabbed on to one in a million pieces of junk! NOW WHAT ?!? Here is the question (That was not even lightly touched upon) : What is your friggin’ plan for to clean the junk from space ??? Very disappointing article!
Millions of objects? Let’s be a little more accurate, with our numbers sir. As of 11/22 NASA’S US space surveillance had a mission to count EVERYTHING in earth’s orbit that was larger than 10 cm. They completed this task, and the total was 25,857. Of those 25,857 objects 5,465 were active satellites or space-crafts/stations. So just over 20,000 items bigger than 10 cm, not millions. Is the answer to this launching a robot to clean it up? No. No it is not. Why? How is each robot going to get to the point where it meets with the junk? A rocket, which will dispose its OWN PIECES into space. There is an answer. The nations need to unite, like they did with the UN, and set some SPACE STANDARDS. Right now, anyone can send whatever they want, whenever they want, from wherever they want. Elon musk sent a Tesla that is just floating out there. We need to have a conversation about why we are accessing it, how we are accessing it, and who can use the data that is accessed. I genuinely believe that people who TRULY think that we can terraform Mars because the Earth is changing- need to WAKE UP. Even if we had all of the technology to do this, they forget about the major problem, the same problem is causing the issue here on Earth. Us. We have to focus on re-terraforming EARTH for our future generations, not Mars. Space is an amazing place for networking capabilities, data storage, even energy production and transfer- it is NOT an amazing place for travel. Until our countries can unite and build a structure of laws, nothing is going to get better.
Space, Joe, is NOT, “Full of Junk”. Regardless of the click-baity title and the misleading graphical representations, we certainly could be heading for catastrophe if the industry does not pay better attention. The base premise is very true and correct. This particular company, if it ever gets fully funded and gets their day in space, is a long way from being meaningfully productive to help the ISS before the ISS is retired. This article lacked the explanation of how the “claw” provides the necessary delta v to deorbit the debris or derelict vehicle. Is this “claw” for one object? Multiple objects? Your article showed the Vega rocket (most likely the Vega-C in the future) as the suggested launch system for this project. Not very cost effective. I hope they can fly along on a ride-share flight.
I’m not sure this particular plan makes ‘economic’ sense… I didn’t totally grasp the size of one of these robots, but there is going to be a set number (likely small) that you can send up per (expensive) launch, plus then the actual cost of each of these individual robots… Also, are these one time use vehicles? (I got that impression… But didn’t actually cover what is happening once the debris is captured).
Most of humanity is like this: “Litter everything and if it becomes a problem, clean it up”. I’m of the “avoid garbage in the first place, then there’s nothing to clean up” variety. Avoiding trash is always easier and cheaper than cleaning it up. Same in my household. The less I make a mess of my kitchen, the less I have to clean it up. I simply avoid making stuff dirty or having stuff lying around, then I also don’t have to constantly clean and tidy up stuff. I remove excess water after showering (quick and easy with a window squeegee), so limestone never builds up in my shower (which is very hard to remove, often requires aggressive cleaning agents and still a lot of scrubbing). I do change socks, underwear and t-shirts daily but I wear the same jeans or pullover a couple of days, so I don’t need to wash that often (why not if they are not sweaty or dirty?). I don’t eat in my car or allow anyone else to do that, so I don’t have to deal with crumbs and fat from fatty fingers. You can waste so much time and money on cleaning up a mess that would have been easy to avoid in the first place. I wish more people had this mindset, also when it comes to our environment. Instead of destroying and then somehow trying to repair, just don’t destroy it.
Cool concept but it won’t make that much difference sadly. The big stuff is easy to track and maneuver to avoid, and we can take simpler measures like adding dragsails to prevent more large objects (fragmentation sources) from being added. The millions of small fragments are untrackable and you’d never have enough propellant to make a dent in the population with individual rendezvous maneuvers. Laser ablation is the only remotely feasible solution for the small fragments
This thing doesn’t look serious to me, and the article is quite shallow. For starters, it has not enough arms: there’s no redundancy, and the gap between arms is very big. Second, this article doesn’t show anything beyond the grabbing moment itself: a tiny bit about what happens before it (you need a lot of fuel to match the speed of a piece of debris) and nothing about what happens after it (is this thing really just single use?).
Let’s say this “Tentacle”-satellite works perfectly and can grab objects at any reasonable speed and rotation. 1. Then, how do you prevent creating new “microlitter” when holding mechanically the large litter object? It will hit the tentacles itself and maybe even the body of the cleanup-satellite. I liked the idea with magnets proposed at the end because there would be much less risk of creating new litter. Keep in mind that this microlitter travels extremely fast and can pierce satellites and objects which are in perfect condition. 2. Now the trash is in the tentacle. What next? You first of all have enlarged the surface of the original trash with the Tentacle. Are you going to navigate to Earth’s atmosphere to let it burn down? Expensive and not scalable. Are you going to navigate away from Earth into the depths of space? Expensive and again not scalable. So is there are “Garbage Truck for Tentactle Cleaning Satellites” waiting to be filled in space? What’s the solution here?
I feel like this is bullshit. Do all the space junk settle into a stable orbit and not fall back to Earth? And catching space junk is like randomly throwing a marble from the Moon onto Earth and then trying to trace the marble. Now increase the diameter by at least 100km and thus the surface area. If you say 2000 km the surface area is 3.14*1000^2. 3 million km2. Wow good luck and have fun. And then calculate the odds of an actual collision. Not a very smart website. There’s a stink of some snake oil somewhere here.
I really hope this project evolves beyond a single-use claw. Picking up the big stuff isn’t the way out because the small stuff is the real threat, and beyond just how wasteful it is to fire a rocket for every piece of debris we remove every failure will just compound the problem even more. This may actually be worse than nothing in it’s current state.
If space is really a ‘common area’ then people shouldn’t be leaving their trash behind in the common area. They should be planning for the end-of-life of their satellites, and have a plan to deorbit the satellite and remove it when they’re finished with it, instead of just leaving it behind to crash into something else. I know this isn’t easy, but it is necessary.
😢 Oh boy, that was a bad example – cars on a 2 dimensional road. If you’re trying to educate people about the scale of space, the universe and the scale of earth. you can’t use crappy oh boy, that was crappy – examples. you can do better PBS. You may not know this, but there are 8 to 28 km between all these different chunks of crap in space and they’re all at different altitudes so. geez.
Grabbing orbital, tumbling SpaceJunk seems to bear some semblance to Life in the deep abyssal ocean! Animal creatures there evolutioned to have long spiky teeth and tentacles, even hanging a “fishing-rod” with a light-bulb out ahead of the mouth. it is the realm of the octopusses! I think this “fishing-” satellite should have 6 arms, or even 2*4: arms + long rubber-elastic tentacles.
but what its going to do when it grabs the junk? steer itself and a junk down to the earth? wouldn’t that be expensive? also, they are training AI pilot for just the cone, but when two satelites colide they will have million different looking pieces, AI must be trained to recognize all of them, also it needs to match orbit and orbital speed…. (head explodes)… by my thoughts this is WAAAY more dificult than presented, but still, someone has to do it
We could start by cleaning the surface of our oceans of junk. Once we’ve done that, we’ll know a lot more, and have a lot less junk hurting species. I have considered that Infra-red lasers could be used to apply small amounts of light pressure as objects approach on their orbits. Striking thousands of objects every day, for just a few seconds would serve to lower orbits, or perigee until they re-enter. This would require a lot more radar information, and a lot of computing power to prevent aircraft and useful stuff being hit by the beams. 1:13 – Your analogy is bad, and for several reasons. Space and being on-orbit are not a highway, nor a road of any kind. Getting all emotional about space junk is very trendy – isn’t it? But how many satellites have been lost to it? How many missions lost to it? It’s kind of like in Star Wars when they head into an asteroid field, and C3P0 says “Sir, the chances of successfully navigating an asteroid field are 3,720 to 1”. That is Hollywood F&%ktardery. In our own asteroid belt the average distance between objects is 1,000,000km – or 2.5 times the distance from the Earth to the Moon – about 3 light seconds or so! And the average size of objects is very small. Most are gravel sized. And so when you fly “through” the asteroid belt, there is functionally no difference at all to passing through empty space. And such is the status of space junk. Your animations look dire because the point size is far too large, and your scale is way too small. Space Junk is a classic case of worrying about stuff that we can’t really do anything about because we are not yet rich enough, and we don’t yet know enough.
This is a terrible idea. If there are millions of pieces of space junk in orbit, how could rocket missions possibly be the solution? Are “fleets of space garbage sweepers” really a better option than just jetting ocean water up from the upper atmosphere to create a cloud that sucks the momentum out of everything passing through it? Sure this means total erasure of EVERYTHING in orbit, but rebuilding and relaunching our orbital infrastructure into a perfectly clean environment is an obviously superior course to take instead of the obscenely tedious task of launching millions of grabber bots. It would give us a fresh start with improved comprehension of the challenges involved and all the replacement satellites would be built with the latest cutting-edge technology instead of half of them being coldwar era clunkers. These clear-space people just want to do everything the hard way.
This article seems a bit bias. The chance of pieces hitting oneanother is quite small, as you can see, since the ISS has been operational for so long, as have many satelites and Astronaut was ever hurt from spacejunk. The fact that Debri is flying in 3 dimensonal space makes a coollision way less propable as implied by the article. It wouldnt be like driving over a road with crashed cars, I’d be like diving though the ocean with some “crashed” submarines. The space is also a factor. Everything near earths atmosphere, as stated in the article will fall down in a few yeas and we wont be locked here forever, even debrie higher up often has no perfect orbit and will fall back to earth and beyond that the space is so vast that it’d need a looot of junk to be a real threat for future space missions. This is a real problem, and we should design space missions with that in mind, but its not as bad of a problem as often stated.
While this is an issue, it certainly is not a catastrophe in the making. articles like this are just HYPE to get people spun up. The car example is ridiculous. You have to understand that SPACE IS HUGE and it’s 3 dimensional!!! As an example, the image of a cloud of debris floating around the planet is COMPLETELY OUT OF SCALE. Even the smallest speck in that image would have to be the size of a small city. To prove it, go look at any article or photo from the ISS, etc and tell me how many pieces of junk or other satellites you can see floating around… Well you can’t. Here’s an appropriate example to scale – Right now, there are 10k aircraft flying in just the first 6 miles of airspace above the planet. Look outside the window of the plane and how many other planes do you see? None. Now expand this out to 200 miles above the planet up to 600 miles. SPACE IS HUGE
This article kind of goes a bit hyperbolic with it. Yes lots of space junk is out there, but of you’re talking about at most 1/8 of a cubic km sized objects, and you talking about ranges in 200-800km vertical differences in orbiting height, and talking about even at the most crowded having 20 kilometers differences in orbital paths, thse space objects will not have an even .01% chance of a collision. Earth is big, Earth’s orbits are even bigger. That visualization was not to scale in any capacity. If it were you would see the night’s sky littered with satellites.
i think this is not the best solution, because is too expensive, for each piece of garbage you’ll need one of this robots and it gets destroyed, not good. We have to find a way for one robot to grab as many object as posible before geting destroyed and at the same making it reliable so it doesnt become trash itself or worst. I think somethin simple that intercepts objets and bumps them a liitle so they fall to earth would be the way to go, but in need precise calculation in real time
Think of the tongue of a frog, flexible, sticky. Tentacle/ Sticky Tongue like. It might require less maneuvering and precision than a rigid device. Not speaking of my own silly suggestions, but often times I’ve considered the benefit of 1 million people working on a problem instead of less than 50. Imagine the increase in intellectual horsepower applied to a problem. The contributions of thousands or a million or so minds to an AI algorithm.
I am here predicting that, once we really find a reliable solution for this problem, The governments would advertise the hell out of it, And the rate of creating space junk would keep out pacing the cleaning.. forever.. (Why? Because when you have someone clean your mess, you don’t feel ashamed for it.)
It’s mind-blowing to understand that a difference of just 100 km means a piece of space junk stays up there for 10 years – or 100 years!!! How much of the space junk is metallic? Could we “sweep” a given orbital path with some kind of magnetic doohickey? Failing that, how hard would it be to “nudge” some of the objects into that lower orbit so that they naturally fall on their own over a shorter period of time? I can definitely see how the 1 centimeter sized fragments are the biggest problem. If I had to handle a thousand bits of trash, each 1 cm in size, I’d just…use a broom and dustpan, or maybe a vacuum cleaner if the material wouldn’t damage such a thing. So the first thing that comes to mind for me is some kind of mass-motion solution. Some way to knock stuff into a decaying orbit, to burn up in the atmosphere, or some way to gather it all in, a miniature accretion process.
Excuse my limited knowledge about space, but I have a thought experiment. Yes, this project is expensive and may not be able to clean small parts, but it can send a strong message to companies and government sectors to act more responsibly in space. Just like we do on Earth, we should be mindful of our actions there. Despite the notion that space is vast, I believe that space debris could eventually form a synthetic moon. Returning to the topic, this is a great project, and I am proud of those motivated to pursue it. However, I have a suggestion for anyone capable of building it. Again, excuse my limited knowledge about astronomy, but why can’t we use high-power lasers from the ground? I know it would require a lot of science and money, but if we could destabilize objects in space by heating them beyond their current state of energy and mass, and if lasers can have this effect, I believe the project would receive substantial funding and support. In fact, this could shift humanity’s ideology towards this challenging task. As a computer engineer, my suggestion is to create a prototype and test it. This could work.
The whole article I was waiting for the most interested part, answering questions like: what does the robot do with the junk after it catches it, how to clean objects that do not fit in size (smaller and larger objects). Do we need to launch a robot for every junk piece up there? Doesn’t sound sustainable. What’s about trying to push junk closer to Earth by lasers? Etc. etc… The article doesn’t tell anything about how it gonna work, just saying that the problem exists. Not very informative this time.
Beware. The CLAW! The big pieces, like defunct satellites, is not the real problem. The real problem is nuts, bolts, flecks of paint, all travelling at tens of thousands of miles per hour. I know that a UK aerospace concern, Skyrora has plans to help clean up orbital debris as well. I applaud any and all efforts to do that, because at this point, the Kessler Syndrome almost seems inevitable.
I think you missed a very important point in this article. It’s extremely important to clarify how far apart satellites and space debris is from each other, and how tiny this all is compared to even the (relatively small) vastness of low-earth orbit. The real problem is not how likely these events are, but how bad that unlikely event can impact LEO by adding tens of thousands of small pieces to the equation. IMO the more impactful solutions are the ones dealing with collision avoidance rather than cleanup. In addition to the ISS, Starlink also has built-in collision avoidance capability, as well as many other modern satellines. Unfortuantely, many companies and space agencies still launch rockets and spacecrafts with no such capabilities.
Probably stupid basic layman’s idea: 1) Create small machines that consist of something like: a) a few cheap cameras or something to determine rotation, direction, and velocity by comparing against the stars and earth or whatever (or some other cheap mechanism that has the same function), b) a small booster of whatever size necessary to de-orbit n-sized space junk, c) a cheap computer and battery. d) magnet, or a clamp, or space-glue, or something 2) Place several of these onto a larger satellite with an arm or something that can: a) approach space junk and somehow attach one of these onto it. b) retreat from the space junk 3) The machine could then determine when it is oriented properly with its onboard cheap disposable cameras and computer, and fire its booster and de-orbit the space junk. 4) Satellite transits to other space junk and repeats with additional de-orbiting machines 5) Profit??? Additional machines could potentially be reloaded onto the satellite by another replenishing satellite and continue de-orbiting more junk, or the satellite can de-orbit itself when it has exhausted its magazine of de-orbiting machines; whichever is cheaper or simpler or whatever.
Why not just knock the debris out of orbit so that they fall back down and burn in the atmosphere? We just need to knock them hard enough to reach a speed of 1km/h (0.28m/s) for them to be able to return to earth within a couple of weeks. The energy required to do this is also ridiculously low, only around 40 joules per 1 ton of weight, so it would be doable and possible to do multiple times in succession.
Can’t we just make some super sticky and slimy substance which has a super high viscosity and make like a giant gel net and capture all the space crap that way? :—-) Something that will only ever stretch and stretch and stretch, a never tearing super gel net? I think I just fixed our space junk issues, you’re welcome Humanity.
This article does not address the very crucial questions like: What does a garbage collector do with the collected junk to dispose it? How do the added masses of junk affect the mass and the limited energy ressources and therewith capability to navigating of the capturer? Imho adjusting the capturers speed and rotation to the junks flight curve will cost immense amounts of fuel. Disposal of junk will, of course, also cost enormous amounts of fuel – considering the junks impulse would have to be slowed down to make it fall back from its orbit towards earth and burn up in its lower atmosphere (or is there any other resonable way of disposal?) How will the capturer protect itself from those millions of blueberry size hypersonic speed bullets out there?
“Here’s how to clean it up”… … lots and lots of aerogel (for the smaller bits). The way Nasa collected spacedust for research is a great way to get rid of the clutter. It’s not a standalone project, but when we get in the kepler syndrome era it’s the only way that remains. It’s already tedious relying on using grabbers and nets, even with zero new satellite launches, it would quickly become a century long task but a necessary step.
Now run the simulation at scale and show the reality of the situation rather than just the hyper exaggerated and hyper delusional version where all those objects aren’t kilometers apart. Space junk just needs to contact the atmosphere. Once it does it’s pulled down and vaporized. This problem solves itself by simply not adding more junk.
If we had manufacturing in space, we could collect the space junk and turn it into more useful objects, instead of having it just burn up in the atmosphere. Doing so would would also make astroid mining more available. I don’t think that a station required to to perform space manufacturing should be built to concentrate soley on space junk though. There are pharmaceuticals and other things that benefit from production in space rather than on earth, so there’s plenty to do at such a station while not recycling space debris or mining asteroids.
I don’t like the idea of one-time disposable cleanup launches – unless, it is in the scale of dozens like Starlink is deployed. however, if you use your “bus” to be a new propulsion system for a target satellite, it can make more sense even on one-time flow, as your grabbing claw, can be used to “bound” those two satellites, and make it a refurbished one.
Any system that requires you to launch, rendezvous, and then deorbit both the system and the target is entirely useless. The launch itself creates more space junk than the mission removes. The only approach that makes any sense is laser ablation. Of course, that’s also a weapon…so… Can’t have your cake and eat it too.
Every sateliite launched should have a fund set aside for cleaning it up after its operational lifetime, or if it breaks down. This fund can then be refunded if the satellite is able to deorbit by itself, but if it can’t, the fund will be used to launch a recovery mission using a device like described here. As far as I know, a similar thing is these days required for things like wind turbines, mining, and many other such projects: They must have a fund set aside to pay for decommissioning it if it becomes unusable or reaches the end of its life.
I obiously don’t know as much as the professional space teams, but I feel like this has to be one of the worst ways to deal with space debris? Not only would you have to do that, as pointed out at the start of the article, millions of times, but spend weeks/months teaching the drone to be able to pick up a single piece of debris.. Again, I don’t have a solution for this problem, as no one does at this point, but I hope we find one that isn’t millions of round trips grabbing single peices of debris at a time. Also just putting this out there before someone tries to use it as a gotcha, I know they are probably doing this as an exercise/learning lesson, but I also realize that each trip is incredibly expensive, both in value and environmental damage
No not an astrophysicist, and this is merely an idea. Grabbing space junk can be inefficient on time and energy as it grabs one object at a time. Also it needs to be at low earth orbit which would be like adding a garbage truck on the highway, yes it does clean, but it’s another object to avoid. There’s also no determination of how this garbage collected is disposed of. My proposal is to send a solar mirror focuser into geospatial orbit (just higher than low earth orbit) and blast or burn it away using several of these at low earth orbit objects. Itself will be powered by the sun and can move the mirrors precisely
a one time garbage collector satelite? how do you even talk with them without laughing? this is so impractical its absurd. like trying to sepparately employ 1 person for each trash piece on the road. was this website always this much “i heckin love science” startup pseudoscience bullshit or is this a new thing?
Wouldn’t it be easier to use a net or something similar, so the “cleanup-robot” doesn´t need to match the rotation of the debris? Then it would maybe also have more space left, for e.g. additional fuel to use the robot more than once before deorbiting it, as the claws seem to use up quite some room if you also include their motors and additional needed generators for them.
I know nothing about science but in my humble opinion, I guess that we can send robots into space to collect smaller debris and then we can use the friction explosion when objects passing through the atmosphere. So the collected small debris would be burnt into ashes to make none of them can reach the earth surface in forms of solid and cause no damages to anyone. So what we need is a method of how we can get them to fall into the earth. What we should do is to make the collected debris heading for earth, then let the atmosphere get rid of the debris. Then most of those smaller debris will be gone by this method. And then collect bigger ones by clawing robots to get self destructed in the space.
They need satellites in a high geostationary orbit with solar panels and lasers that can zap space junk on every pass until its orbit degrades. If you had a few of them up there in different positions you could be targeting thousands of pieces with short pulses every time they pass one of the satellites.
This mission seems entirely impractical and wasteful. I feel resources can be used in a better more effective way, not only do they need the delta v to get and match the junk’s orbit, they also need left over fuel to slow it down to burn in the atmosphere and not to mention the smaller fragments in orbit that go unaffected.
First solution is to plan for the disposal of satellites and everything else we leave up there. Rockets should release spacecraft without leaving any parts up there other than the spacecraft. Any orbiting craft need to be designed to deorbit when they are no longer used. Biggest step is to stop causing more damage.
I feel like the UN needs to elect one larger or several smaller countries as garbage man every 3 years or so and actually make this a priority. Whatever is invested in it, belongs to the collective. Everyone benefits. But it needs to be somebody’s direct responsibility at all times because otherwise we just keep passing the buck.
How about sticky fly traps for space trash? Seems more feasible than creating a space squid to grab trash. I just don’t see how a claw will be able to tackle the scale of the problem that’s just growing. The benefit of sticky strips is it could catch all sizes. You could add controls on either side to redirect the strip into the atmosphere when finished.
This article does a great job explaining the problems with space junk and cleaning it up, but doesn’t really explain much about this claw satellite, which was really the only reason I was perusal. Sending 1 claw up to grab 1 piece of junk and then bring it down and burn up seems like a massive waste of resources. Also with the humongous amount of waste in space, what is the point of removing this 1 nose cone that kept being mentioned. My understanding is that it is the minor pieces that are the bigger threat as they are so hard to detect to avoid collisions. So many questions about this claw, as presented this claw seems really dumb and a complete waste of time…
There are 25k pieces of space junk. Think of 25k cars (for perspective, there are 14.5 million registered cars just in the state of New York alone). Now imagine those 25k cars driving with their foot to the floor in every direction all over the planet. Not just on roads, but EVERYWHERE. The chances of one car hitting another is slim. 500km above the earth, the earths circumference is much greater AND this space junk is at different altitudes hundreds of kilometers in difference. Sure, space junk will eventually become a problem but we’re far from seeing a demolition derby in space.