Lara Zanoni on the Challenges of Space Debris

Building awareness of space debris is essential to normalising sustainable and ethical behaviours in space, argues Lara Zanoni. 

 

This article was published in Issue #1(31) 2022 of Room The Space Journal of Asgardia.

 

As the space industry develops new markets to meet the challenges of space debris, Lara Zanoni, Marketing Manager at AstroAgency, questions the behaviours at the root of this issue. 

 

Space debris was first theorised as a risk in the 1970’ by prominent NASA researcher, Donald J Kessler. This risk has now materialised and presents an institutional headache as well as a clear and present danger to rapidly expanding orbital infrastructure projects. Crystalised through the prism of now-mainstream climate change concern, these plans are coming under more widespread scrutiny for their eventual ecological fallout. 

 

But the very technical challenge of space debris finds its roots in a larger context, from an impotent legal framework and hazy international guidelines to practices unconcerned with long-term ethics.

 

As access to space becomes easier, Lara Zanoni suggests the path to sustainability will come from building awareness by tracking and cataloguing debris in a database and inviting humanities professionals to open the conversation on the issue.

 

Read Lara’s full opinion: Source

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