The team explores the technical complexities of laser-based collision avoidance, an approach to safely redirect space junk away from the path of active satellites.
With space getting increasingly crowded, space debris represents a major problem to future missions. Vital services like communications, navigation and weather forecasting are severely limited without functioning satellites.
The European Space Agency is already making use of laser technology to detect and monitor space debris with the Izaña laser ranging station complex. But what if we could also use laser technology to actually prevent collisions?
ESA, from its European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), began exploring this concept with a general feasibility study funded by its Space Safety Programme. This effort has since progressed: meet OMLET (Orbit Maintenance via Laser MomEntum Transfer), a ground-based solution being advanced to mitigate collision risk into low Earth orbit.
Based on a high-power laser platform integrated with precision pointing systems and adaptive optics, this concept will enable the application of small, controlled velocity changes to space debris objects. Through the interaction between the laser beam and the illuminated object, a slight trajectory adjustment could reduce the probability of conjunction or even prevent collisions.
OMLET is currently transitioning from requirement definition stage to design and implementation. The current Phase A/B1 is carried out by an international consortiumconsortium led by the Institute of Technical Physics at the German Aerospace Centre (DLR).