Tool bag joins space litter: Why space community is losing sleep over junk orbiting Earth?
What are different kinds of space garbage floating around today? As the problem gets bigger, how is a concerned space community dealing with it? The Federal explainer
Litter is not just a terrestrial problem, it seems. International space agencies, governments and the space community around the world are increasingly worried over the 170 million pieces of junk swirling around the earth's orbit.
It can be in the form of a mere glove dropped by the first American spacewalker ED White in 1965 or parts of satellites and decades-old inoperative spacecraft. The latest litter to join the upper atmosphere above the Earth is a toolbag valued at $100,000, which slipped away while two American astronauts were out on their inaugural spacewalk. Incidentally, in 2008, another spacewalker too had dropped a tool bag accidentally while trying to clean up a leak. Though much of the space debris eventually dies a fiery death as it falls through Earth's atmosphere like White's glove eventually did, but some larger debris can pose a huge problem.
The Federal explores why space agencies are losing sleep over space junk and focusses on the various efforts to clean up space:
To start with, what is space junk?
Space junk is made up of bits of tech that are in orbit around the Earth but are no longer in use. Litter has been amassing since the time the first human-made satellite, Sputnik 1, was launched into space on October 4, 1957. But, as satellite operations become more prevalent and the space economy accelerates, with the rush for orbital space launches worldwide, (in 2022 there were a record 174 launches), humans seem to have left their mark in space in the form of rubbish.
The junk can include the stages from rockets that jettison satellites into orbit and the satellites themselves once they die. But, it also includes slippage such as smaller bits and pieces lost to space like a paint flake that came off a device, nuts and bolts, garbage bags, a lens cap and screwdriver.
Most unusual piece of space junk?
The most unusual item of space debris has been the spatula lost by the late astronaut Piers Sellers in 2006, say reports. This simple spatula became famous and was nicknamed “spatsat” and was tracked through space by Nasa as it whizzed towards Earth.
Which body monitors space debris?
Of the 55,000 pieces of debris that humans down on earth can track, more than 27,000 objects, like spent rocket boosters, active satellites, and dead satellites, are monitored by the United Department of Defense's Space Surveillance Network. The group is tasked with detecting, tracking, and cataloguing the many human-made items swirling around the planet using a global network of telescopes.
Why is space debris dangerous?
Space debris can be risky because it can collide with other objects and trigger a lot of damage.
According to experts, the objects in orbit tend to criss-cross each other’s paths very quickly. And, if they collide, even a small-sized debris can still create a lot of damage to space missions. For example, a tiny paint flake orbiting Earth chipped one of the windows on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2016. This raised a lot of questions over the need for "neighbourhood trash removal".
In fact, the International Space Station had to dodge debris collisions by performing some maneuovres a couple of times.
Space debris can be dangerous for the 10,000 odd satellites in space, which facilitate the functioning of television channels, GPS and internet in remote locations. The space debris sometimes are not more than around 1 cm and larger — but they travel several times faster than a bullet. And, experts say that a collision between the debris or with active satellites can be devastating.
NASA boss Bill Nelson once told the BBC that space junk was a "major problem" and the International Space Station has had to be moved out of the way of debris flying past.
"Even a paint chip… coming in the wrong direction at orbital speed, which is 17,500 miles an hour [could] hit an astronaut doing a spacewalk. That can be fatal," he said.
These collisions has the capacity to not just destroy entire missions but also create large new debris fields.
Besides the concern of immediate low earth orbit congestion, there is also the risk of Kessler Syndrome, in which current debris can in turn create a growing and self-replicating cascade of orbital junk. As a single collision can generate thousands of particles of space trash.
Have in-orbit collisions happened before?
The much-quoted accidental in-orbit collision has occurred between two satellites n February 2009. In 2009, the inactive Russian satellite Cosmos 2251 collided with the active American communication satellite Iridium 33 approximately 804 km above Siberia and this resulted in approximately 2,000 pieces of debris at least 10 cm in diameter and thousands more smaller pieces entering the Earth’s atmosphere. It is estimated that over 50 per cent of the debris from Iridium 33 will remain in orbit for at least a century, and that of Cosmos 2251 for at least 20 to 30 years.
Efforts to clean up space debris
The World Economic Forum, in collaboration with the European Space Agency, has published the 'Space Industry Debris Mitigation' recommendations to increase collaboration to reduce space debris; more transparency among operators; to accelerate technologies and practices for the disposal of spacecraft at end-of-life; and the removal of existing space debris already in orbit.
There are many private companies working on technology to clear space debris as well.
Last year, the UK Space Agency awarded ClearSpace and another company, Astroscale, £4 million to design missions to extricate existing pieces of space debris. Announcing the funding, the Agency described orbital congestion and space debris as one of the biggest challenges facing the global space sector. It has committed £102 million up to 2025 to technology that can track objects in space and reduce debris.
The Tokyo-based Astroscale, with subsidiaries in the US and Britain, is testing a debris removal device called ELSA designed to latch onto defunct satellites and drag them toward Earth's atmosphere to let them burn off.
One of the funders is Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa, who tweeted when he invested $23 million in Astroscale, "Garbage scattered in outer space can become a big problem in the future."
There are companies working on sustainability solutions like deploying service satellites to approach and latch onto broken or fuel-spent spacecraft to extend their lifespan.
Australia-based Neumann Space, for instance, is developing a technology that could help recycle old, defunct satellites into fuel - using the scrap metal to generate plasma thrust for new satellites. This can be used in partnership with satellite-serving companies, it hopes.
NASA has suggested that a list of the large debris, greater than 10 cm be made and to prioritise nudging large debris like non-functioning satellites, spent rocket stages, and other large debris using ground lasers.
Imposing fines
Meanwhile, the US’ Federal Communications Commission irecently set the ball rolling by cracking the whip on operators for creating space junk. In October, they fined a company Dish Network $150,000 for failing to move its old satellite far enough away from others in use. Dish's EchoStar-7 - which was first launched in 2002 - was in geostationary orbit, which starts at 22,000 miles (36,000km) above the Earth's surface.
Dish was meant to move the satellite 186 miles further from Earth, but at the end of its life in 2022, it had moved it only 76 miles after it lost fuel. And it posed a potential risk to other satellites orbiting the Earth at its current altitude. This move was a breakthrough to make satellite operators accountable.
