Will the International Space Station's 2031 death dive cause pollution problems?

[Admin]

The International Space Station will be steered to a controlled destruction in Earth's atmosphere in 2031, if all goes to plan. Should we be worried about the pollution this death dive will cause?

Will the International Space Station's 2031 death dive cause pollution problems? : Read more

 

[steve_foston]

I think deorbiting the ISS to Earth is the wrong strategy, instead its should either be placed at the L2 point or moved to the surface of the moon. Apart from the pollution it will cause it is an important historic artefact and should remain in place for future generations to study

 

[psburdett]

I think deorbiting the ISS to Earth is the wrong strategy, instead its should either be placed at the L2 point or moved to the surface of the moon. Apart from the pollution it will cause it is an important historic artefact and s

I think deorbiting the ISS to Earth is the wrong strategy, instead its should either be placed at the L2 point or moved to the surface of the moon. Apart from the pollution it will cause it is an important historic artefact and should remain in place for future generations to study

Steve, After the HUGE cost of sending all that weight into space, agree that there may be some future use of all that metal and even reusing solar panels. The relative cost of storing the ISS in a "safe place" is small. With an option for future use/repair/parting out for other projects.

 

[billslugg]

It took 9656 m/s delta V to get the 400 tons of ISS where it is. It would take 20 m/s slowing down to re-enter Earth's atmosphere. It would take another 3912 m/s to get it to geostationary orbit. It is a matter of extreme cost to boost it much higher.

 

[bolide]

I expect that setting down the ISS on the moon would exceed the cost of sending astronauts to the moon.

 

[Hm00b]

How much does it cost to keep it empty (un-inhabited) but floating in space? Instead of bringing it down, build a new one next to it. I'm sure that a good portion of it can be salvage for other purposes.

 

[billslugg]

ISS must have people inside it, operating it, or it would quickly degrade where no one could ever safely re-enter or hook up to it. No one wants any used parts. The cost of orbiting mass is now trivial. The cost of raising it to permanent orbit is prohibitive. It would take something on the order of thousands of boosting missions to get it to a high enough orbit.

 

[bolide]

ISS must have people inside it, operating it, or it would quickly degrade where no one could ever safely re-enter or hook up to it. No one wants any used parts. The cost of orbiting mass is now trivial. The cost of raising it to permanent orbit is prohibitive. It would take something on the order of thousands of boosting missions to get it to a high enough orbit.

Agree with everything you said except "The cost of orbiting mass is now trivial," at least as applied to the ISS. Nothing trivial about having to constantly rotate astronauts up & back. The only sensible fate for the ISS is to let it fall, and even that we are now seeing is problematic.

 

[Jim Franklin]

It needs to be remmebered that this is 40 year old technology - much of the design was done in the decade before it was launched, and whilst some equipment has been updated, the majority of it is well passed its use by date to point where catastrophic failure of major components is expected.

Before the components are deorbited, any volotiles, such as chemical, oils or other such materials will be removed and returned to Earth, the empty husk will be broken into contituent parts and then provided with the requisit momentum for a shallow re-entry as this will minimise deorbit energy required and maximise atmospheric friction, increasing the amount of heating and thius ablation of the components, this means less will make it to the surface, and that which does will splash down in the ocean where impact will obliterate it with the remains sinking to the ocean floor.

Pollution is a mimal issue that is being overplaying. Keeping it in orbit or moving it to the Moon is simply not feasible, it is designed to operate with Earth's magnetic field shield, moving it to L2 or the Moon would negate this benefit and it would become a death trap for anyone using it unless they worse an EVA suit continually - not practical.