Computer generated image showing the debris cloud around Earth.
SECURE WORLD FOUNDATION PRESS RELEASE
Now is the time to reduce the threat to both human spaceflight and satellites from destructive space debris.
That viewpoint emerged from a major gathering of space experts at the International Interdisciplinary Congress on Space Debris, held May 7-9 at the Faculty of Law, McGill University in Montreal, Canada.
The Congress brought together legal, policy, and technical experts from around the globe, including the U.S., Russia, India, China, Canada, and Europe – a unique gathering of officials to thrash out legal, and technical ideas for the next phase of dealing with the space debris issue.
Critical steps and options
Over the past decade and a half, the world’s major space agencies have been developing a set of orbital debris mitigation guidelines aimed at stemming the creation of new space debris and lessening the impact of existing debris on satellites and human spaceflight. A version of these guidelines was unanimously endorsed by the United Nations in 2008 and several States are in the process of implementing or have already implemented these voluntary measures.
The Congress noted that a critical next step is engaging with the growing number of developing countries that are using satellites to help protect their populations and manage natural resources. While they may not have independent spacefaring capabilities, orbital debris is an area of concern for them and they can contribute meaningfully to the process.
“Space debris is primarily a global issue. Global problems need globally solutions, which must be effectively implemented internationally as well as nationally,” said McGill University’s Ram Jakhu, Chair of the Congress.
“Tackling the difficult issue of mitigating the destructive effects of space debris requires the attention of experts versed in the legal, policy, and technical and scientific aspects of space debris,” said Dr. Ray Williamson, Executive Director of Secure World Foundation.
“This interdisciplinary Congress illuminated many of the most difficult and thorny issues inherent in tackling space debris problems and provided some important suggestions on a way forward,” Williamson said.
To this end, the Congress explored a variety of legal options for further implementation of debris mitigation guidelines. One possibility mentioned is the establishment of an international regime for dealing with orbital debris similar to the Missile Technology Control Regime, or perhaps the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963. There are a variety of other means within international law as well, including codes, declarations and treaties.
Next phase of debris mitigation
Up until now, the debris mitigation process has been focused mainly on the technical aspects, with an enormous amount of research producing excellent recommendations, noted Brian Weeden, Technical Consultant for the Secure World Foundation.
“However, the community is now starting to focus on the legal aspect, which is critical for broadening and strengthening the adoption of debris mitigation guidelines and space safety in general,” Weeden said.
Weeden explained that the recent Congress explored lessons from terrestrial environmental pollution law as well as maritime law that could be applicable to outer space. Furthermore, international law isn’t necessarily the only method for implementing the guidelines. “We are also looking at a variety of other mechanisms, to include economics and industrial standards,” he said.
Emerging consensus
There was definite consensus from the gathering on the importance of Space Situational Awareness for all space actors, as a means of learning more about the space debris problem and how to tackle it. Many also believed that any international space debris regime also needs to be developed with an eye to the future and an eventual international space traffic control system.
The discussion of orbital debris doesn’t stop with the McGill Congress.
Planning for a second workshop at the University of Cologne in May 2010 is already underway. Sponsored by the German government, this follow-on event will take the inputs and discussions from the McGill Congress and generate specific policy, legal and technical recommendations for the next phase of dealing with debris mitigation.
Additionally, researchers are moving towards the next phase of scientific study. “There is an emerging consensus among the technical community that simply preventing creation of new debris is not going to be enough,” Weeden emphasized.
“At some point we will need to actively remove debris from orbit. Fortunately, new studies are showing that removing as few as five or six objects per year could stabilize the debris population over the long term. The big question right now is which objects to remove first and what is the best method to do so.”
Event information
The International Interdisciplinary Congress on Space Debris was co-organized by the McGill University Institute of Air and Space Law, Montreal, Canada and the Cologne University Institute of Air and Space Law in Cologne, Germany; and the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety in Katwijk, the Netherlands.
This impressive gathering of experts was co-sponsored by the Erin J. C. Arsenault Trust and the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs in Vienna, Austria. Erin Arsenault is the daughter of Secure World Foundation founders, Cynda and Marcel Arsenault.
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As the titel above says “Atlantis Suffers Minor Heat Shield Damage”. There is so much Space Debris right now that spaceflight or opperations in space now more and more unsafe! The changes becomes greater by the day, we must tackle that problem first before we explore again!
Development of A Ballistic Orbital Debris Removal System
Submitted by: James E. Hollopeter
Director, Technology Development
GIT Satellite Communications
jim.hollopeter@gitsat.com
Introduction
Space is filling up with trash, and it’s time to clean it up, NASA experts warn. A growing amount of human-made debris—from rocket stages and obsolete satellites to blown-off hatches and insulation—is circling the Earth. Scientists say the orbital debris, better known as space junk, poses an increasing threat to space activities, including robotic missions and human space flight.
“This is a growing environmental problem,” said Nicholas Johnson, the chief scientist and program manager for orbital debris at NASA in Houston, Texas. Johnson and his team have devised a computer model capable of simulating past and future amounts of space junk. The model predicts that even without future rocket or satellite launches, the amount of debris in low orbit around Earth will remain steady through 2055, after which it will increase. While current efforts have focused on limiting future space junk, the scientists say removing large pieces of old space junk will soon be necessary.
Statement of the problem:
Since the launch of the Soviet Union’s Sputnik I satellite in 1957, humans have been generating space junk. The U.S. Space Surveillance Network is currently tracking over 13,000 human-made objects larger than four inches (ten centimeters) in diameter orbiting the Earth. These include both operational spacecraft and debris such as derelict rocket bodies. “Of the 13,000 objects, over 40 percent came from breakups of both spacecraft and rocket bodies,” Johnson said. In addition, there are hundreds of thousands of smaller objects in space. These include everything from pieces of plastic to flecks of paint. Much of this smaller junk has come from exploding rocket stages. Stages are sections of a rocket that have their own fuel or engines.
These objects travel at speeds over 22,000 miles an hour (35,000 kilometers an hour). At such high velocity, even small junk can rip holes in a spacecraft or disable a satellite by causing electrical shorts that result from clouds of superheated gas. Three accidental collisions between catalogued space-junk objects larger than four inches (ten centimeters) have been documented from late 1991 to early 2005.The most recent collision occurred a year ago. A 31-year-old U.S. rocket body hit a fragment from the third stage of a Chinese launch vehicle that exploded in March 2000.”We’ve been fortunate that in all three cases only a few [new] debris [fragments] have been created,” Johnson said.
Best-Case Scenario
Previous space junk projections have assumed that new satellites and rockets would launch in the future. The new study, in contrast, looks at what would happen to the amount of space junk if no rocket bodies or spacecraft were launched in the next 200 years. “This is kind of a best-case scenario,” said lead study author Jer-Chyi Liou, principal scientist and project manager for orbital debris with the Engineering Science Contract Group at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. The results suggest that new fragments from collisions will replace the amount of objects falling out of orbit and back to Earth. Beyond 2055, however, fragments from new collisions will exceed the amount of decaying debris. “The debris population will continue to grow,” Liou said. “We know it will only get worse.”
Removing Junk
Johnson, the program manager for orbital debris, says space-faring nations agree that the space junk problem needs to be addressed. There is even a special organization called the Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee, made up of space agencies from ten countries and the European Space Agency. So far, efforts have concentrated on preventing new debris. Johnson believes it may be time to think about how to remove junk from space. But that is a difficult proposition. Previous proposals have ranged from sending up spacecraft to grab junk and bring it down to using lasers to slow an object’s orbit to cause it to fall back to Earth more quickly. Given current technology, those proposals appear neither technically feasible nor economically viable, Johnson admits.
But, he says, the space-junk problem needs more attention. “It’s like any environmental problem,” he said. “It’s growing. If you don’t tackle it now, it will only become worse, and the remedies in the future are going to be even more costly than if you tackle it today.”
Potential solution:
As previously stated, many scenarios have been put forward to remove unwanted and potentially dangerous space debris from orbit. All of these techniques are, on the surface, unfeasible, beyond the scope of present technology, prohibitively expensive and in some cases would present their own hazard to legitimate orbital objects.
GIT’s proposal is to attack the problem using a sub-orbital approach that cannot add to the orbital junk problem. Based on studies done under the Space Defense Initiative in the ‘80’s and on previous anti-satellite studies, GIT proposes a sub-orbital payload lofted to the appropriate altitude that could clear or reduce existing debris from selected areas of low earth orbit. By using a ballistic launch profile, there is no chance of adding to the existing debris problem. The payload would re-enter at the end of its mission, as well as all of its lower propulsive stages.
There have been many suggestions to orbit a vehicle to collect debris and then de-orbit the debris using onboard propulsion systems. This is a very expensive approach. It would require all the associated ground control systems that are needed for any orbital missions today. By using a sub-orbital launch profile and existing sounding rockets in use today, a small ground based infrastructure, which presently exists could easily handle the launch load.
There are many launch sites all over the world to support this type of mission. Since this debris problem exists for all space faring nations, the task could be shared among all users.
Payload:
Many payloads have been suggested to de-orbit the space debris. Most collect the debris and then de-orbit, while others such as tethers, would slowly lower the orbits until atmospheric drag takes over to de-orbit the debris. GIT’s approach is to use water, H2O, as the passive payload. It has the highest volumetric efficiency in the payload space. It can easily and predictably be deployed and has significant mass that will be used to reduce the debris orbital momentum. The payload would be launched retrograde to the target debris orbits. The resulting collisions would easily reduce the velocity of the smaller debris. The dispersion pattern of the water in space could be easily adjusted to accommodate the required velocity reduction for the target debris. Widely dispersed for very small objects of interest or narrowly dispersed for a focused collision of larger objects.
All of these dispersion techniques could easily be tested here on earth in many test areas or chambers available today.
The chart above demonstrates the payload capability of an off-the-shelf Black Brant X sounding rocket at various launch angles (elevation) compared to the orbits of various well know space objects. A demonstration of the feasibility of using a water payload to clear debris can be done at relatively low cost.