About ESA
The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Highlights
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Space in Member States
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Germany
Austria
Belgium
Denmark
Spain
Estonia
Finland
France
Greece
Hungary
Ireland
Italy
Luxembourg
Norway
The Netherlands
Poland
Portugal
Czechia
Romania
United Kingdom
Slovenia
Sweden
Switzerland
Science & Exploration
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicAstronauts
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Enabling & Support
Making space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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The protection of space assets
There are a great many objects in orbit around Earth, mostly comprising functioning and dead satellites as well as fragments of past break-ups, explosions and collisions. Some 36,000 objects larger than a tennis ball are orbiting Earth – and only 13% of these are actively controlled. The rest is space junk that threatens all the satellites on which our economies and society depend.
On top of this growing hazard, space weather caused by unpredictable solar activity can damage and even destroy satellites and can cause power blackouts and cut communication networks on the ground.
Developing an air traffic control system for space would protect civil infrastructure on Earth.
Europe must develop operational, real-time systems to enable the detection, identification and avoidance of natural and human-made space hazards. The need to remove dead satellites from orbit means developing a new European commercial capacity to provide innovative in-orbit services, like deorbiting, repairing and refuelling active satellites, creating a circular economy in space.
Novel technology will be required for these ambitious steps, which are proposed as part of the new ‘Protect’ Accelerator, one of three currently being defined to help shape Europe’s future in space.
