Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps the Government is taking to (a) prevent and (b) reduce the amount of space debris.

The Government is committed to ensuring the long-term sustainability of outer space and has taken proactive measures to prevent, mitigate and remove space debris.

In carrying out safety assessments under its licensing process for activities in outer space, the UK Space Agency considers operators’ collision avoidance and debris mitigation measures as applied over the entire time the spacecraft remains in orbit around the Earth.

The Government also actively participates in a number of multi-lateral fora, including the UN Committee on Peaceful Uses of Outer Space and its Subcommittees (UN COPUOS) and the Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee (IADC), as well as a number of bodies defining safety standards. Within these fora, the Government works collaboratively with international partners to define best practice and the associated guidelines that will ensure space remains accessible for future generations.

Finally, the UK plays a leading role in supporting the development of technology for the sustainable and responsible use of space, having invested strongly in European Space Agency (ESA) programmes aimed at preventing collisions in space, improving detection and tracking of objects in space and fielding demonstration missions of active capture and safe de-orbiting of spent satellites. The UK Government has also licensed a number of UK-operated technology demonstration missions for active debris removal in orbit.