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_shapeshifting t1_jd0zcqw wrote

Reply to comment by threebillion6 in 10 months after its launch by SpaceX, a $10,000 satellite made by students with off-the-shelf materials and powered by 48 Energizer AA batteries, is not only working, it's demonstrating a way to reduce space junk by lughnasadh

you don't actually collect it, you use a laser to turn small deadly things into significantly less dense, less deadly clouds of plasma.

EDIT: the same people who launch their own commercial satellites have a financial incentive to pay for the solution to make their satellites safer.

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threebillion6 t1_jd10mt3 wrote

How powerful a laser are we talking about? I could see that going badly very quickly.

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_shapeshifting t1_jd12pst wrote

powerful enough.

I can imagine paint flecks destroying the ISS, so which one do you want: a solution with risks or risks without solution?

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KruppeTheWise t1_jd10nud wrote

If you aim the laser correctly the gases boiling off the sats surface will push it out of orbit too.

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_shapeshifting t1_jd1344t wrote

that'd be a really strong laser lol.

I'm imagining this as a solution for the 1 million+ objects the size of flecks of paint. maybe the ones as big as a marble.

to boil a whole satellite would be hardcore but also insane

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