Whose job is it to clean up all our space junk?

Which is a problem, considering there are an estimated 100 million pieces of debris larger than 1 mm cluttering Earth’s orbit. And while we tend to think of things in space as just floating, that isn’t the case with all this junk. Since it’s in Earth’s orbit, it’s all moving at a speed of 15,000 mph, which is 10 times faster than a bullet. At that speed something as minuscule as a fleck of paint can become extremely dangerous, with the power to puncture spacesuits.

So why hasn’t anyone done more to clean up all that debris? Because it’s no one’s job to do it. Outer space isn’t under anyone’s jurisdiction, so there’s nobody in charge to say, “Hey, we need to clean this up.” It’s a principle known as a “tragedy of commons,” when everyone has access to a common resource so none of them have the power to regulate it, so it gets overexploited.

As a body with a large number of nations claiming membership to it, the United Nations has been called upon to be that overarching regulating body. But not every nation, particularly those who have built space programs, are members of the UN, so it wouldn’t be able to regulate their activities. And private companies aren’t beholden to anyone either. Some organizations have taken voluntary action to be responsible in space, such as NASA with its Artemis Accords, but again, not everyone is included here. For now, it appears to be a problem without a solution, but it’s one we should probably put our collective minds to sooner rather than later, before space gets too cluttered.