ESA Space Environment 2025 figure 2

ESA’s debris modelling tool MASTER shows that in the low-Earth orbit range of around 550 km altitude there is now the same order of magnitude of debris objects posing a threat as there were active satellites in 2024.

These preferential altitude ranges for communication constellations still show a clear peak in satellite concentration. However, compared to the previous years, a significant chunk of the active payloads in constellations are flying significantly lower, with about a quarter now in the sub-500 km altitude bands.