Earth’s space debris crisis will not be solved until there ‘have been enough disasters’, astrophysicist says

It is ‘too late’ to keep the Earth and Moon a ‘pristine environment’, Princeton professor Adam Burrows said

(Pixabay)

Space debris building up above the Earth orbit will only be addressed by governments and companies after it has caused more disasters, one astrophysicist has predicted.

Adam Burrows, a professor of astrophysical sciences at Princeton University, told The Independent that it is “too late” to keep low-Earth orbit - 2,000 kilometres from the surface of the planet - a “pristine environment”, and likely too late for the Moon, but not too late to protect Mars.

“Competitions between nations are being played out not only in low Earth orbit but also on the surface on the Moon”, he told The Independent.

“People aren’t concerned about [planetary protection] from the lunar perspective because people aren’t worried there may have been life there or that we’ll contaminate it with our own biology.”

Such an event might have already happened, as a crashed Israeli satellite deposited tardigrades - considered the most resilient life form on Earth – on the Moon in 2019.

Space debris around the Earth has been a continual threat to the success of both state and private space endeavours, including the International Space Station which had to perform evasive maneuverers to avoid Russian detritus this year.

“There have been collisions of big objects, a big object on a big object creating debris, and so just by the environment that has been created now there is the potential of a cascade of events that will lead to that environment being uninhabitable”, professor Burrows said – describing a series of events known as the Kessler Syndrome.

Posed in 1978 by Nasa scientist Donald Kessler, it warned that the domino effect of such an event could create an impenetrable layer of debris that would make terrestrial space launches impossible – essentially trapping us on Earth.

“The Kessler syndrome is already operating – just on long time scales. If that timescale, at various altitudes, becomes short enough for many people to notice, perhaps people will turn to trying to solve the problem”, professor Burrows said.

“Just as the oceans and the Earth’s environment, it’s been a dumping ground. There is a tragedy of the commons – where it’s an available resource to all, but many entities use it without regulation or responsibility.”

While professor Burrows caveated this analysis by saying that this view “isn’t backed up by the best models”, he added there was a “real chance” humanity was close to the event – “close enough for me to even suggest it.

““That timescale may be hundreds of years, but that timescale will be shortening as we add things and as that debris accumulates. And when that timescale is 10 years or 20 years, which would be catastrophic, then people will have to take notice.”

Moreover, neither governments nor private companies have the inclination nor the technology to tackle this problem and international space treaties need to be updated desperately.

This is because there is no business model for industries to profit from, and governments are reluctant to take responsibility for discarded rockets. There are also numerous military concerns, because if a private company in the United States can get close enough to its own country’s satellites it can also get into close proximity with a foreign powers’.

“You have to make sure that other nation states are comfortable with this technology being in space and servicing these various other companies where it has a military use, in principle”, professor Burrows said.

“How do you lower the political temperature enough? It requires negotiation. It requires a few more disasters. There have already been disasters to some degree. There haven’t been enough.”