Debris Cleanup

[trekkie_]

I've just been playing around with a possible solution to manage space debris.

Its function is basically to be attached to an unmanned probe of some sort (just for guidance and thrust/maneuver). the probe will have 2 parts, a fuel tanker type system to keep it fueled, which it can detach from to do its duties without risk of harm to other equipment that doesn't need to be in harms way. essentially what this is, is a scoop that allows the probe to deflect or guide or even hurtle debris toward the atmosphere.

now if we had a material that could withstand impacts without matching speed, it could just align itself with the debris orbit and wait for it to pass by, letting it slip in through the bottom slit and deflecting it into the atmosphere...most fragments will still be headed on the same relative trajectory due to the deflection. in space, even if debris impacts could be withstood, that debris would most likely explode in all directions, the trick is to make it funnel out in the direction you want it to, and shape plays an important role in that. even if debris was traveling at just 100mph toward the earth when it deflected, it would take mere hours for most debris to deorbit.

another more costly but more 'realistic' function would be to match speed with an object and 'catch it', where it can either be nudged out of orbit, or possibly even trapped inside the arm and rotated at a fast enough speed to fling the object (or again, collected). this would probably be more useful and cost effective for larger more dangerous debris currently in existence. even the highest altitude objects could be brought down in a relatively short amount of time.

Since man made debris is generally traveling at a slower speed, matching orbit shouldn't be as much of a challenge....you only have to do it, oh say.....19,000 times for the larger debris (5cm+). but if you had a whole group of these things working around the clock taking care of multiple debris per day, you could produce real results in years. if you're just matching orbits, and it's only 5cm object, these probes could be pretty small, especially if they have a refueling station in orbit.

Probably completely flawed (and similar to current ideas), but fun to ponder

Edited October 18, 2013 by trekkie_

[Idobox]

You would need some pretty insane accuracy in your trajectories to catch anything like that.

The best proposition I've heard is the laser broom. Use a laser to ablate part of the debris, which causes a little thrust and a change of orbit. If you did it right, the new orbit will have a lower apoapsis and decay rapidly. If your laser is powerful enough, you don't even need to focus and aim precisely, and you can 'sweep' a number of debris at the same time.

[jwenting]

as most space debris is just that, debris, bits and pieces of rocket fairings, spent stages, stuff like that, utterly useless to have a solution like yours that require something to be attached to it in just the right spot that something else can latch on to.

Not only are there many thousands of bits already up there that don't have that attachment, and as Idobox points out the accuracy required would be insane (remember those pieces are tumbling out of control as is), but adding those things to everything launched in the future would be prohibitively expensive. The added atmospheric drag and mass from those bits would cripple most rockets out there, reduce their useful payload to the point they can no longer lift their intended cargos to their intended orbits.

Any solution you come up with has to act irrespective of the size, shape, and mass of the thing you're trying to sweep out of orbit, be it a cargo fairing of a Delta IV, a spent stage from an Ariane V, a satellite the size of the HST that failed to make its intended orbit, or an interstage that's fractured into hundreds of pieces after colliding with something else.