There are 300,000 pieces of garbage orbiting earth, and it's a big problem

Right now, there are more than 300,000 pieces of debris larger than a centimeter in diameter orbiting Earth.

They range from tiny shards of metal to deactivated, decades-old satellites. Most are shrapnel from discarded rocket stages that have exploded after use, or satellites that have collided. Colloquially, all this debris is usually called "space junk."

Together, the Department of Defense and NASA track the orbits of the 19,000 or so pieces of junk that are larger than a softball, alerting satellite operators when any satellite — including the International Space Station — is in danger, so they can move it.

Heh, sorry, didn’t mean to be cantankerous.

Actually, a lot of stuff in low orbit, where the space junk problem is worst, will fall to Earth in much less than hundreds of years, due to friction with gas molecules causing the orbits to decay. (Think Skylab, Mir, etc.) Most spacefaring nations are working on ways to reduce addition of more junk, so perhaps the problem can be at least mitigated somewhat, with time.

The above brings up an idea: Launching Al Gore into orbit and letting him yammer would create the emission of huge qty’s. of gas molecules into low Earth orbit. Launch him and Chris Christy, and you’d also block enough sunlight to cool the Earth - not that it actually needs it.

Actually, sarcasm aside, there are thoughts of using lasers or intense light beams to affect “junk” objects’ orbits. Also, down the line, small asteroids could be deflected into orbits around Earth, which asteriods’ gravity could move the junk into concentrated regions, or direct it into Earth’s upper atmosphere, while sweeping other regions relatively clear. (Maybe Earth would end up with rings like Saturn, but made of space junk?!)

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