ClearSpace-1


The ClearSpace-1 mission is an ESA Space debris removal mission led by ClearSpace SA, a Swiss startup company. The mission's objective is to remove the PROBA-1 satellite from orbit. The mission aims to demonstrate technologies for rendezvous, capture, and deorbit for end-of-life satellites and to build a path to space junk remediation. Destructive reentry will destroy both the captured satellite and itself. It is expected to launch in 2029.

Overview

In 2019, the company won a tender for a ESA's Space Safety Programme contract in the Active Debris Removal/In-Orbit Servicing project. ClearSpace-1's original target was the VESPA payload adapter from the 2013 Vega flight VV02. In April 2024, the target was changed to the PROBA-1 satellite. The mission contract, worth 86 million euros, was signed in November 2020. ClearSpace-1 was expected to be launched in the second half of 2026 on a Vega-C launch vehicle.
The VESPA adapter that ClearSpace-1 originally aimed to capture is the size of a washing machine and weighs about 112 kilograms. ClearSpace-1's device has been described as a four-armed "space claw" that would grip VESPA and steer it back into the Earth's atmosphere, where both would be destroyed via destructive reentry. On 22 August 2023, the European Space Agency announced that the VESPA adapter had likely been hit by a small piece of space debris earlier in the month, resulting in the creation of several additional pieces of trackable debris. Due to the possibility of a collision with debris, the agency opted to change ClearSpace-1's target to the PROBA-1 satellite.

Similar attempts

The ClearSpace-1 mission was preceded by e.Deorbit, a space debris removal mission under planning by ESA in 2010s. In the end, the e.Deorbit mission was not implemented, the satellite was not built and the whole e.Deorbit mission was cancelled. ClearSpace-1 continues the ESA space debris removal aspirations.
Tokyo-based Astroscale is a space debris removal company testing a removal device called End-of-Life Services that successfully demonstrated many of the key technologies required for space debris removal in 2021 and 2022, including magnetic docking with a client in 2021 and close approach RPO in 2022. ELSA-d was in its de-orbiting phase.
In 2022, the UK Space Agency awarded £4 million to ClearSpace and Astroscale to remove non-operational British satellites by 2026.