Two days ago, the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, issued its first-ever fine for leaving space junk. Today on The Old and the New, I will be covering the FCC’s space debris fine — and whether or not it's a promising way of combating the problem of space junk. 
But first, what is space junk? Space junk, also called space debris or orbital debris, is a term used to describe any piece of human-made machinery left in space. This can refer to anything from rocket-launching material and decommissioned satellites floating in space to paint flecks that have fallen off a rocket. 
On October 2nd, the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau fined DISH for failure to properly deorbit its EchoStar-7 satellite. This is the first-ever space debris enforcement made by the commission as the FCC has recently started to step up its satellite policy efforts. 
According to an announcement of the Commision action, “The settlement includes an admission of liability from the company and an agreement to adhere to a compliance plan and pay a penalty of $150,000.”
So, why is this so important? 
In layman’s terms, the debris left in space moves very quickly and can collide with things in space and damage them due to the speed of collision being so quick. A risk this poses is that satellites like GPS satellites in geostationary orbits or military satellites can be damaged. This high-speed debris can also pose a risk to the life of astronauts who do spacewalks and manned missions. 
In fact, taking collisions with space debris into account is a major part of modern aeronautical engineering with lots of research going into developing a strong and reinforced exterior for objects that will be sent to space so that collisions with debris in space do not result in a breach of its exterior. 
 In fact, the International Space Station, or ISS, regularly makes collision avoidance maneuvers to avoid getting damaged. 
FCC officials Enforcement Bureau Chief Loyaan A. Egal said, “As satellite operations become more prevalent and the space economy accelerates, we must be certain that operators comply with their commitments.”
So, will the FCC’s action really be useful?
A lot of companies put things into space and so far they haven’t really had a return plan for how those things come back once they’ve been put out of use. While the fee could help lower the amount of orbital debris left behind by giving companies an incentive to have a way to return it back to Earth, that only applies to future missions. The space debris that’s currently in space will not be affected by this.
 Thus the FCC's actions will have no short-term effects as there is still lots of space junk in space, but will likely have long-term effects as less orbital debris gets left behind. Even then, the effectiveness of this approach is to be seen and it’s too soon to tell whether this move will have any real impact. 

Thank you for listening to The Old and the New and see you next episode