I think most orbits naturally decay, too, so there’d be a time limit even if we couldn’t clean things up.
But intuitions fail when it comes to how mind-bogglingly big and fast space is. The volume you might need to sift through has an area equal to the surface of the entire planet and a height of thousands of kilometers. The objects you're trying to grab are moving at >20,000 km/hr. Low orbits do decay naturally in a few decades, yes, but MEO and GEO orbits can take thousands to millions of years to decay.
It's like being a war zone where bullets that are fired continue ricocheting through the air for decades, and these objects are moving ten times faster than a typical bullet (and may weigh hundreds of kg). We're laying a minefield and not even keeping track of where the mines are laid. The least we can do is to keep track of and share the satellite orbits.
However I think people underestimate ingenuity and the ability to solve the cleanup problem if we really have to. I don’t know how much effort has really be invested in hitting that cleanup problem as hard as possible, as most discussion about it currently is theoretical, and there isn’t a lot of financial benefit to researching it.
If it starts preventing launches, then the incentives to hit the problem harder increase.
It’d obviously be better not to be forced into figuring out whether that problem is solvable, my point is it’s not set in stone that it’s an unsolvable problem, and the incentives are currently such that I don’t think we can consider possible solutions adequately explored.
Not that it isn't something we should be concerned about, but especially the higher up you go the more that concern should be tempered by the sheer remoteness of the odds of a collision.
The size of a sphere at geostationary orbit altitude is essentially irrelevant, because the only reason you go to geostationary orbit is to be geostationary, i.e. in a narrow band at the equator. The other 99.9% of your sphere is completely unused.
Tens of years? Try tens of months. The ISS has a minimum mean altitute of 370 km, a max of 460 km, and within those parameters loses about 2 km per month. But the lower it gets, the faster it falls. When it's on the lower end of it's range, it falls about 3 km per month and that would accelerate rapidly if allowed to go lower. As it is, the ISS is boosted several times a year; five times this year so far: https://www.heavens-above.com/IssHeight.aspx They can go as long as a few months without boosts, but not much longer than that. Not tens of years.
The ISS is big and draggy, but the situation isn't much different for smaller satellites in similar orbits. Two test satellites for Starlink, Tintin A and B, were launched to about 500km in 2018. Both have subsequently burned up in the atmosphere after less than three years: https://www.n2yo.com/satellite/?s=43216
> It sounds like you're [...] ignoring the advice of experts
Heh, forgive me for this but it seems like you have some half-baked ideas about Kessler syndrome you gleaned from popsci media. The reality is not so simple, nor as extreme, as you've made it out to be. Your estimates for LEO are about an order of magnitude off.
BUT - So long as SpaceX avoids being seen as "at fault", any Kessler sh*t-storms that occur are likely to prove huge opportunities for SpaceX, and huge problems for all of their competitors. Most debris-storm clean-up ideas require plenty of launches, to get the Wonder Widgets and Space Squeegees into orbit. Likewise the replacements for all the smashed satellites. Which replacements may be substantially heavier, due to beefed-up propulsion systems for debris dodging, armor protection around their vitals, etc.
And guess what company is the world's miles-ahead provider of low-cost orbital launch services, with an easy path to oh-so-profitable scaling up?
I highly recommend the Starbase tour with Everyday Astronaut, especially Part 3 [0], for perhaps the best existing look into his thought process and development philosophy. Throughout the tour he comes across as humble, ready to incorporate ideas and truly entertain questions from a studied layman. What also really speaks for him is how he is treated by his employees, how he treats them, and how involved he is with the ground level of the operation. It is evident to what deep level of urgency and importance he approaches the undertaking that SpaceX is and so I do not believe they would seek to profit from controlling Kessler Syndrome.
I get the feel that logic from /Hollywood/tropes/James_Bond/ is being assumed here. In a simplistic action movie, it's reasonable to say "IF $Charismatic_Corporate_Leader profited from $Bad_Thing happening, THEN he is Totally Evil, secretly controls $Bad_Thing, and caused it to happening as part of his Evil Plans".
The Real World(tm) isn't like that. Elan and SpaceX don't control Kessler Syndrome. They are not the U.N. Space Police*. (Cripes, they can't even get timely launch approvals from the FAA, or a more sensible exclusion zone at the Cape!) "Failing" to have detailed plans & preparations for an orbital sh*t-storm - IF they don't cause it, and aren't badly damaged by it - is no more evil than "failing" to donate $75 million to African famine relief.
*Not a real thing. The point is that SpaceX ain't the law, ain't the sovereign, and ain't on some government contract to provide space emergency services & disaster relief.
(FWIW, I found the first two Starbase tour videos more interesting. Admittedly, they had the advantage of being ~3x longer.)
(Edit - formatting issue from an un-escaped '*' character.)
Also a not-so-relevant nitpick - I wouldn't call Elon charismatic. Perhaps in a room full of engineers he may be. Nevertheless I still applaud him for learning how to be more personable in the corporate world.
Agreed, the first two videos were more captivating in their window into Musk's technical thought process (during which I took notes!) and the current SpaceX developments. The third struck me as a unique look into his everyday dealings while at the same time driving home how important he feels the entire undertaking is. The tone is different in the 3rd one. Much more of a serious message in contrast to the euphoric geekery in the first two.
(Yes, I know that "Moonraker" was an extremely profitable Bond film. No matter how idiotic the [cough][gag]science in it was, Hugo Drax was trying to wipe out most of humanity.)