What is Space Debris?
As we said in our post, The Future of Space Industry in 2020, space debris, or space trash is a hot topic this year. The fragments remain from a satellite breakup, malfunction, collision, and explosion are called space debris, and a large amount of waste in LEO (Low Earth Orbit) would compromise safety in spaceflights. To solve this problem, mitigation measures aren’t enough, active removal of the debris is necessary.
According to NASA and ESA, even in an ideal scenario without launches or explosions, debris objects would continue to grow by collisions in a process called Kessler Syndrome. As informed by ESA in January, there are over 3000 dead satellites in space, and almost 2000 live ones. Mitigation and active removal measures are more effective if applied as soon as possible, and before the number of critical objects in space is above the sustainable level.
What is ClearSpace-1?
At the end of November in the Space19+, ESA’s Ministerial Council came together to decide the future activities for the incoming years and secure its budget. It was placed a contract with a commercial provider for the removal of an inactive ESA-owned object.
A Swiss startup, ClearSpace, formed by a team of space debris researchers from the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) research institute led a consortium where they have proposed ClearSpace-1, the first space mission to active remove an item of debris from LEO. The estimated date for the mission launch is in 2025.
The mission’s target is a Vespa (Vega Secondary Payload Adapter) ejected from ESA’s Vega rocket launched in 2013 and left in orbit. Its simple shape, 100kg, and its size similar to a small satellite make it a perfect target before progressing to more complexes captures. It may even allow multi-target removal missions in regions with critical-size debris concentration.
ClearSpace-1 will be deployed into a lower orbit than the Vespa debris, where it will undergo operational tests, before using its four robot arms to capture the Vespa. After that, they will reenter Earth’s atmosphere and burn up, eliminating both.
The mission counts with the support of ESA’s new Space Safety program, where ESA is developing a project called Active Debris Removal/ In-Orbit Servicing – ADRIOS. Its results will be applied to ClearSpace-1.
According to ESA, to a more efficient removal, while picking a target it is necessary to consider:
- The mass of the object, the largest piece of the debris, causes a more significant environmental impact in collisions;
- High collision probabilities;
- And it should be in high altitudes.
Even though removal targets and technology should be approached from a global perspective, there are legal constraints and responsibilities when dealing with the ownership and validation of objects, making the process more difficult. Clearspace-1 is one step to take the discussion about debris further.
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Written by: Juliane Verissímo
Featured image courtesy of ClearSpace
