Managing Space Junk

A new NASA study suggests that de-orbiting five major pieces of space junk per year, coupled with less dramatic measures such as burning off fuel from old satellites, as well as discharging batteries that are no longer useful, could stabilize the problem of space junk in low Earth orbit at the current level for the next 200 years.

That, of course, would stabilize the situation at a relatively high risk level, but that would be preferable to letting the problem continue to develop. The key to ultimately dealing with this problem may well rest in Russia. Due to the robust space efforts over nearly six decades of the Soviet Union/Russia, the bulk of the junk is owned by Russia. Concentrating on de-orbiting American pieces would be a start, but finally dealing with the problem will require Russian cooperation.

De-orbiting large pieces of junk, such as spent rocket stages, by the way, could be, if properly structured, an early successful industry in the commercialization of space.