Taxing congestion of the space commons. (December 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Béal, Sylvain; Deschamps, Marc; Moulin, Hervé
• Is Part Of: Acta astronautica. Volume 177(2020)
• Page Start: 313
• Page End: 319
• Publication Date: 2020-12
• Subjects: Space debris -- Satellites -- Space agents -- Tragedy of the commons -- Collision -- Tax system -- Game theory; Astronautics -- Periodicals; Outer space -- Exploration -- Periodicals; Astronautics; Periodicals; 629.405
• DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2020.07.036
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0094-5765

Abstract

Abstract: Satellites launched by independent spacefaring agencies and firms create space congestion and collision risk. Taking as benchmark the cost of a marginal reduction of the congestion rate, we discuss tax mechanisms financing a debris removal effort. We compare the non-cooperative equilibrium traffic when there is a tax on each new launch to recover cleanup costs, with the welfare optimal traffic under a centralized tax. We find that under the latter it is twice as easy to recover cleanup costs and increase traffic than under the former. We also show that a linear tax is twice as effective as a quadratic one.