TL;DR
Every rocket stage left drifting and every satellite that dies in orbit adds to a crowd of junk circling the planet, and that crowd has been growing faster than anyone is cleaning it up. India now says it wants to stop adding to it. Under a "Swachh Space" (Clean Space) vision, its government aims to end the creation of new orbital debris across both government and private Indian missions by 2030, according to a secondary report. In the same week, a Hyderabad startup called Cosmoserve Space opened a facility to build a mothership that would carry small robotic service vehicles to inspect, refuel and drag dead satellites out of orbit. Prevention from India, plus a homegrown space tow truck in the works: that is two more hands on the broom. To see our odds on when the first piece of junk actually gets hauled down, and the timeline of breakthroughs that leads there, subscribe.
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