Russian space agency Roscosmos has unveiled its plan to shoot down space debris from a junk-littered low-earth orbit with a three-meter laser ‘cannon.’ If the tests are a success, the method will ensure safer space exploration.

The technology is being developed by scientists at the Research-and-Production Corporation Precision Systems, which is a subdivision of Roscosmos.

In its report to the Russian Academy of Sciences, the company asked to support its research and development, as well as experimental work to create a solid-state laser that will be able to shoot down space junk by vaporizing it with a beam.

The powerful ‘laser cannon’ will be based on a three-meter optical telescope, construction of which is already underway. The telescope, designed to monitor space for satellites and potentially dangerous space junk, will be transformed into an equally giant laser if the project is greenlighted.

A type of solid-base generator will supply power to the laser, the report, seen by RIA Novosti, says. The space trash destroyer will use the process known as “laser ablation” to remove the debris from spaceships or any other junk, like a cosmonaut's lost glove floating in low-earth orbit, which is between 160 to 2,000 kilometers (100-1,240 miles) above the Earth’s surface. The laser's energy heats an object that is pierced with a beam until it gradually evaporates.

NASA estimates that there are more than 500,000 pieces of space junk “the size of a marble or larger,” which can be tracked as they are travelling at speeds of up to 17,500 miles per hour around the Earth. It warns that even “a relatively small piece of orbital debris” can inflict damage upon spacecraft and satellites. Of about 500,000 pieces of space debris, 20,000 are “larger than a softball.”

With more countries engaging in space exploration, the task of avoiding collisions with the growing mass of space debris becomes ever more pressing. As the concerns mount, a number of countries have already entertained the sci-fi-like idea of creating a weird mix of a laser weapon and a garbage processor. Back in 2015, Japan’s RIKEN research laboratories said they were planning to add a small laser to a telescope they were developing for the ISS, and scale up the method if it proves to be successful.

The idea has been picked up by China. In February, scientists at the Air Force Engineering University in China published a study suggesting that the junk could be blasted by space-based lasers.

Australia’s EOS Space Systems revealed in March it is also working on the photon pressure laser. However, the laser is designed so it will not incinerate the debris completely, it will just be able “to nudge space objects around, change their orbits.” However, such approach might actually clutter space even more, as there is a chance that objects will break in two, researchers warn.

A long range of proposals, including giant nets and harpoons to grab debris, have been made by scientists over the years. In April, the RemoveDEBRIS device, equipped with a net and a harpoon, arrived at the ISS on board a Falcon 9 rocket.

In 2017, Japan failed an attempt to clear space junk with a 700-meter tether that was created with the help of a fishing company.

In Russia, invented a laser cannon to destroy space debris

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MOSCOW, June 10 - RIA Novosti. Specialists of the Research and Production Corporation "Precision Instrument-Making Systems" (SPC SPC, part of Roskosmos) are developing technology to reduce space debris from the orbit by exposure to it with a laser beam, according to a report by the SPC SPC presented at the Russian Academy of Sciences. A copy of the report is available to RIA Novosti.

Earlier it was reported that a laser for "shooting" space debris can appear on the International Space Station. Initially, the idea of ​​such an installation belonged to scientists from Japan, but in the future specialists from Europe and Russia joined it. It is planned that as a result of the action of the laser on space debris, it will evaporate.

"To demonstrate the possibility of removing detectable debris objects in low orbits, to support the proposal of NPK SPP" JSC to conduct research and experimental work on creating an optical location system using a solid-state laser and a receiving-transmitting adaptive optical system, "the proposal says.

In NPK SPP confirmed to RIA Novosti the existence of such a document, but declined to comment.

In the "laser gun" is proposed to remake the three-meter optical telescope of the Altai Optical-Laser Center named after Titov. The telescope itself is now under construction. Its main purpose is to monitor outer space in order to track satellites and space debris that threatens them. As sources of power are considered two versions of solid-state generators developed by the St. Petersburg National Research University of Information Technology, Mechanics and Optics.

With the help of a laser pulse, scientists plan to evaporate matter from the surface of space debris, gradually dissolving it in space, using the laser ablation method.

"A successful experiment will open the way to broad support for this important technical area for ensuring security at the national and international levels," the document says.

Earlier it was reported that in the catalog of the Russian Space Monitoring System, there were 13,000 artificial objects: seven thousand objects larger than 20 centimeters in low earth orbit (from 160 kilometers to two thousand kilometers), as well as six thousand objects measuring 20-40 centimeters high (from two thousand to 50 thousand kilometers) near-earth orbit.

According to NASA, in near-earth orbit there are about 19 thousand artificial objects visible from the Earth.

In 2016 scientists of the head scientific institute Roskosmos TsNIIMash came to the conclusion that if not to deal with the problem of space debris, then in 100-200 years the development of space activities may stop - the entire earth orbit will be strewn with debris of machinery.