Satellite warfare: An arms race is brewing in orbit
Obviously the best way to avoid Kessler syndrome is to prevent it from occurring in the first place, but given the widespread short-termism everywhere these days, that seems naïve.Are laser brooms the current state of the art when it comes to deorbiting? From this article [0], it appears to be quite slow but at least highly parallel, "cleaning" an object in 3-4 years but all addressable objects in ~5 years. It's still unclear to me if the principles required for them to function effectively are currently available, or if more development is required first.Another concern is that large installations may be viewed with suspicion, given their potential applications as anti-satellite weapons, especially against surveillance satellites whose sensors (I assume) would be more sensitive to high-intensity illumination. Any ideas on how these concerns might be mitigated?[0]: https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.3835