[gregallan]

There are other attempts at disposal of dead satellites that don’t rely on a long-shot like the BFR [1]. Besides, maneuvering a big heavy spacecraft like that to match orbits with a bunch of little satellites would be tremendously wasteful in terms of fuel. A much better use would be to remove larger satellites like defunct communications satellites. These are actually a much bigger danger to orbital space as well. See this event for example [2], which generated over 2000 pieces of debris large enough to track and many more of a smaller size. Small satellites are not nearly as dangerous because when they are defunct their low mass causes them to renter faster.

(FYI I’m a PhD student in the lab that built the satellite in the article.)

[1] https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2...

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_satellite_collision