There is now believed to be an astonishing 170 million pieces of junk floating in Earth’s upper atmosphere, but only 22,000 are being tracked.

Some 7,000 tonnes of space junk circle our planet, as defunct satellites, junk from rockets and other metals and rocks build up close to Earth.

Technologies such as mobile phones, television, GPS and weather related services rely on satellites, so a cataclysmic series of crashes could pose a threat to our already over-reliant need for satellites.

As a result, China has announced a radicle plan to rid the orbit of unnecessary junk by blasting the debris with lasers.

In a paper titled "Impacts of orbital elements of space-based laser station on small-scale space debris removal”, a team from China's Air Force Engineering University propose a giant laser station attached to a satellite orbitting Earth could obliterate the space junk.

The laser would fire 20 times per second at targeted debris, blasting them into smaller pieces so they pose no threat to Earth and also clear the way for new satellites.

The team write in their paper published in the journal Science Direct: "It provides [the] necessary theoretical basis for the deployment of a space-based laser station and the further application of space debris removal by using [a] space-based laser.”

China is one of the worst offenders for space debris.

In 2007 it intentionally destroyed on of its own satellites as part of an anti-satellite technology test.

Nicholas Johnson, the chief scientist for Orbital Debris, said: “Any of these debris has the potential for seriously disrupting or terminating the mission of operational spacecraft in low Earth orbit.

“This satellite breakup represents the most prolific and serious fragmentation in the course of 50 years of space operations.”