The danger to satellites and space stations from pieces of orbital wreckage after more than 60 years of space exploration has become a commercial opportunity. Our research suggests there are 900,000 pieces of debris in low earth orbit—and even a 1mm-sized object can have a devastating effect. If we continue the way we do, some regions in space will become too risky to visit.

Quadrant’s ClearSky system delivers the provision of both active and end-of-life debris removal services—cutting-edge technologies that enable missions toward capturing and removing environmentally critical debris, such as rocket upper stages and defunct satellites.

It got them big backing. Taylor browsed the information available on Bloomberg and a couple of other business intelligence platforms. The players pumping money into Quadrant had stakes in launch systems, orbital manufacturing, asteroid mining, and space tourism. Evidently, they regarded the clearance of debris as a fundamental necessity. As Fischer had described, two venture capital funds devoted to the commercial space industry—GTX Capital and Celestus Ventures—supplied 120 million dollars to Quadrant over the course of one week in April 2018.

Last month, the US Office of Commercial Space Transportation had approved Quadrant’s request to launch the first components of its debris removal system: a constellation of satellites that would track objects as small as ten centimeters in length. Soon it was hoped they could launch direct from the UK. The 25 million pounds that the British government had directed to Quadrant came via a new development fund for UK spaceports. Sites were under development in Newquay, North Uist, in the Western Isles and Snowdonia.

Taylor sat back, mind spinning. Where was she when the new space age had been announced? Fixated on the terrestrial matters of the Persian Gulf and North Africa. How twentieth century. There was a lot going on to which she had been oblivious.

She kept reading. Geoffrey Payne had attended the launch of the UK Spaceport Alliance. The Telegraph quoted from his speech: “As a nation of innovators and entrepreneurs, we want Britain to be the first place in mainland Europe to launch satellites. This would put the UK in an even stronger position as a leading commercial space nation, while filling the gaps in sovereign capability. Our space industry need be dependent on no one. This island has always thrived on its appetite for exploration, a willingness to seek our fortunes beyond these shores, channeling our creativity and industry and ambitions . . .”

In the week after Celestus Ventures had invested several million into Quadrant, the Financial Times carried an interview with Stuart Adair in which he declared that he was on a mission “to expand humanity’s economic sphere in an unprecedented way.” The FT reported that the recent injection of capital had allowed Quadrant to invest in new facilities in Hawaii, New Mexico, “and on Ascension Island in the South Atlantic.”