Astroscale Is Developing A Space Junk Removal System

Astroscale Is Developing A Space Junk Removal System

     Space junk is a very real problem. It might seem implausible that the space around the Earth is actually getting too cluttered with junk, but, nonetheless, it is true. There are thousands of tons of old spacecraft, defunct satellites, and bits and pieces of manmade trash orbiting our planet. That material poses a some very real risks to future missions. This obviously includes crewed missions to Moon, Mars and beyond.
    Researchers have long been working on designs for many different systems to deal with orbiting trash. There have been proposals such as using huge nets and even harpoons to snag larger pieces of orbital debris and drag them down into the upper atmospheres. Then the heat of reentry would effectively vaporize them. Unfortunately, none of those missions have been a total success. Some of these tests have even threatened to create even more space junk. Now a Japanese company is launching a new test mission to see whether its space trash collector works as well as it hopes.
     The End-of-Life Services by Astroscale (ELSA-d) is a project by Japanese company Astroscale that could result in the first feasible space junk cleanup system. The concept of the new system is to send a spacecraft into orbit to dock with and eventually destroy large pieces of space debris. Astroscale will test this capability by first deploying a test object and then sending the docking spacecraft to track down the object, and connect to it using magnetic plates.
     The Astroscale spacecraft will perform several of these “catch-and-release” maneuvers over a six-month period. This series of tests should demonstrate whether or not the Astroscale system is reliable and efficient enough for future consideration. It sounds like a possible solution for clearing space junk but there is still a big problem to be overcome.
     Unfortunately, ELSA-d is not designed to hunt down pieces of space junk that are already cluttering up the area around the Earth. Instead, the system relies on docking plates that would have had to be installed on future satellites before they were launched. When such satellites are no longer in use, Astroscale spacecraft would track them down and deorbit them.
     This is certainly a significant shortcoming for the Astroscale system, especially since most of the space junk collection systems that have been tested so far are designed to remove orbital junk that is already causing problems. None of the systems tested so far have shown themselves to be very reliable. This means that building satellites with end-of-live deorbiting in mind may ultimately be what is needed if there is any hope of solving the space junk problem at all.
     In any case, it will be interesting to see how well the ESLA-d system performs. Will it be capable of catching and releasing its test “junk” multiple times during its months in orbit around the Earth? Whatever happens, we desperately need a space junk cleanup solution. We need it sooner rather than later or we risk catastrophic consequences such as the possibility that collisions between pieces of space junk could lead to a cascade of collisions and a multiplication of space junk that would prevent future orbital launches.