Europe Is Launching a Suicide Robot to clean up the debris in space

We all know that largest dump on Earth is in Space. 

In low Earth orbit — the space around our planet up to about 1,200 miles (2,000 kilometers) in altitude -  There are more than 3000 satellites which are not functioning and tens of millions of smaller pieces of debris around the atmosphere.  And each one of these is moving at tens of thousands of miles per hour  Some times two big pieces of this debris crash into each other creating smaller fragments which is another junk in space.  All these debris are moving at such high velocities that they can damage a space craft moving in the orbit.

So European Space Agency ( ESA ) has announced its plan to tackle this problem using robot hugs.  In its mission known as ClearSpace-1,  ESA will be launching an experimental, four-armed robot to collect a defunct satellite, hug it closely and then finally drag it on a kamikaze dive into Earth's atmosphere - destroying both devices.

The ClearSpace-1 Mission is scheduled to launch in 2025.  It will test its robotic hugging muscles on a mid size piece of junk called Vespa. Which ESA's Vega launcher deposited about 800 Kms above Earth in 2013.  The weight of that debris is 100 Kgs so it is relatively easy to capture on the robotic mission.

After capture of the Vespa, the robotic garbage collector and Vespa both will make a controlled yet fiery descent into Earth's atmosphere.  The cost of this Mission is estimated to be around $135 millions.

Whether this is a cost-effective way or not,  other nations and agencies are proposing other methods for removing debris like deploying tiny nets and using satellite mounted lasers to blast bits of space debris into atmosphere.