End-of-life deorbiting

September 29, 2022: the FCC cuts from twenty-five to five years the time a low Earth orbit satellite may stay in orbit after its mission ends. End-of-life deorbiting is the obligation on low Earth orbit satellite operators to remove their craft from orbit within a set deadline after its operational mission ends. There are two ways to do it: reenter the craft into the atmosphere, or park it in a graveyard orbit. The traditional international benchmark set that deadline at twenty-five years. The US FCC cut it to five years in September 2022 for low Earth orbit satellites under its jurisdiction, in response to the proliferation of megaconstellations and the rapid growth in the number of objects in orbit. Long declarative and rarely enforced, the obligation now has teeth. In October 2023, the FCC fined satellite television operator DISH Network $150,000, the first US penalty ever issued for a deorbiting shortfall. Its EchoStar-7 satellite had been abandoned at a lower altitude than the one specified in the end-of-life plan it had filed years earlier. For insurance, a once purely reputational risk becomes a direct financial one, and insurers and lenders now scrutinize compliance with the deorbiting plan at underwriting.