5 ms·

Maybe. Putting things into space creates a lot of air pollution.

makerofspoons 7y ago
You could launch 3 Big Falcon Rockets per day for a year and only then equal the emissions for all the air traffic at Heathrow that occurs in a month: https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/8g0iaj/bfr_air_pollution/dz6uz6q?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/8g0iaj/bfr_ai... There are bigger fish to fry in terms of the environment.
- jankotek 7y ago
  Those launches would only put a few thousand tons on orbit, that is nothing for mining operation.
  - headcanon 7y ago
    Getting large-scale mining operations in space, or any kind of industrial base for that matter, would require us to start fabricating things in space. Getting something in orbit will always be expensive and prohibitive, even when space elevators are built, so there will be enough incentive to start building things in space.
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      And then you realize that sending material upwell to support orbital fabrication is uneconomical, while suddenly mining those materials from asteroids makes double-plus sense. Orbital fabrication and mining are intertwined, but together they're the key to any long-term human presence outside Earth.
    - moneytide1 7y ago
      I've wondered how interstellar smelting would work. There would need to be centripetal force on the foundry station to keep metals flowing. Nearby ice could provide hydrogen and oxygen for propulsion and even heat for steam turbine electricity for the plant. Certainly there would be uranium present as well so fission would be an option, albeit more complicated. Four/eight year military service spent policing/polluting the world could be replaced by short "tours" in asteroid belt operations. The key to all of this would be constant launches and flow of material/labor, ideally with international cooperation. The high frequency of launches in itself is a safety feature - stranded crews would be able to expect fly-bys. It would be expensive at first because we would essentially be ejecting many resources away from the planet. But the promise of heavy-industry eventually zoned outside of our natural atmosphere could be the [non-classical] incentive.
      - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
        Rotation might be done with magnetic fields instead of ejecting ionized gas (water etc). And dirty fission power is very practical in space, where the inverse-square law can make it quite harmless.
        moneytide1 7y ago
        Would the magnetic field be provided by an auxiliary station adjacent to the rotating foundry? Or could the structure propel it's own smelting vats somehow via the field on arms attached to a central bearing? It would seem more efficient with a field rather than constantly ejecting usable material. How is the inverse squared law applied to space fission? Ease of cooling?
        ben_w 7y ago
        > How is the inverse squared law applied to space fission? Ease of cooling? If you double the distance, the radiation hazard reduces by a factor of four. This is why the Sun — an unshielded fusion reactor — hasn’t already killed everyone.
  - imtringued 7y ago
    109,500 tons per year to be exact.
- thousandFalcons 7y ago
  If you take a moment to think that through, in global terms, since pollution affects the entire planet, then we see that 12,000 rocket launches means we need to remove one busy airport from service, to break even on current pollution standards, which are already admittedly bad.
  - growlist 7y ago
    So we plant a few million more trees. Win win.
eatbitseveryday 7y ago
> Putting things into space creates a lot of air pollution. Yes, rockets emit a lot, but in the overall, less than automobiles when taking into the frequency of use into account: > Space shuttle fuel consumed in a launch: 3.5 million pounds. Gasoline consumed in one day in the US - 2,500 million pounds. In other words, one space shuttle launch is equivalent to about two minutes of gasoline consumption in the United States. [1] If we use rockets more often, then this would become a larger component of overall pollution. [1] http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2000-10/973014746.Es.r.html http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2000-10/973014746.Es.r....
- dmurray 7y ago
  The Space Shuttle didn't burn gasoline or exhaust carbon dioxide, it burnt hydrogen and exhausted water. So it didn't create meaningful air pollution when launched. Edit: actually it burnt both solid fuel and hydrogen, about 2.2 million pounds of the former.
  - seiferteric 7y ago
    And where did the hydrogen come from?
  - leetcrew 7y ago
    burning hydrogen at high temperatures in the atmosphere can create a good bit of NOx. not so bad when there aren't many rockets being launched, but not something you want a lot of.
bargl 7y ago
This is a complex computation to come up with. Ideally we could set up a mining operation that didn't require additional fuel from earth. That would be costly in CO2 if we used that as a measure. However, after being set up all that would be required for getting gold to earth from space would be de-orbiting the gold. I'm assuming that recovering a de-orbited chunk of gold would probably be cheaper than mining and transporting that gold on the surface of earth. While you are spot on to question the air pollution to get set up mining gold in space, it would require a really detailed analysis to figure out if it would be a net positive or negative for CO2 emissions. It would also need to be considered what happens when humans can start re-fueling spacecraft in space. What would that do to the shipping industry where materials are prevalent in space and can be moved to earth with minimal CO2 from earth.

You could launch 3 Big Falcon Rockets per day for a year and only then equal the emissions for all the air traffic at Heathrow that occurs in a month: https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/8g0iaj/bfr_air_pollution/dz6uz6q?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/8g0iaj/bfr_ai... There are bigger fish to fry in terms of the environment.

jankotek 7y ago
Those launches would only put a few thousand tons on orbit, that is nothing for mining operation.
- headcanon 7y ago
  Getting large-scale mining operations in space, or any kind of industrial base for that matter, would require us to start fabricating things in space. Getting something in orbit will always be expensive and prohibitive, even when space elevators are built, so there will be enough incentive to start building things in space.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    And then you realize that sending material upwell to support orbital fabrication is uneconomical, while suddenly mining those materials from asteroids makes double-plus sense. Orbital fabrication and mining are intertwined, but together they're the key to any long-term human presence outside Earth.
  - moneytide1 7y ago
    I've wondered how interstellar smelting would work. There would need to be centripetal force on the foundry station to keep metals flowing. Nearby ice could provide hydrogen and oxygen for propulsion and even heat for steam turbine electricity for the plant. Certainly there would be uranium present as well so fission would be an option, albeit more complicated. Four/eight year military service spent policing/polluting the world could be replaced by short "tours" in asteroid belt operations. The key to all of this would be constant launches and flow of material/labor, ideally with international cooperation. The high frequency of launches in itself is a safety feature - stranded crews would be able to expect fly-bys. It would be expensive at first because we would essentially be ejecting many resources away from the planet. But the promise of heavy-industry eventually zoned outside of our natural atmosphere could be the [non-classical] incentive.
    - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
      Rotation might be done with magnetic fields instead of ejecting ionized gas (water etc). And dirty fission power is very practical in space, where the inverse-square law can make it quite harmless.
      - moneytide1 7y ago
        Would the magnetic field be provided by an auxiliary station adjacent to the rotating foundry? Or could the structure propel it's own smelting vats somehow via the field on arms attached to a central bearing? It would seem more efficient with a field rather than constantly ejecting usable material. How is the inverse squared law applied to space fission? Ease of cooling?
        ben_w 7y ago
        > How is the inverse squared law applied to space fission? Ease of cooling? If you double the distance, the radiation hazard reduces by a factor of four. This is why the Sun — an unshielded fusion reactor — hasn’t already killed everyone.
- imtringued 7y ago
  109,500 tons per year to be exact.
thousandFalcons 7y ago
If you take a moment to think that through, in global terms, since pollution affects the entire planet, then we see that 12,000 rocket launches means we need to remove one busy airport from service, to break even on current pollution standards, which are already admittedly bad.
- growlist 7y ago
  So we plant a few million more trees. Win win.

eatbitseveryday 7y ago

> Putting things into space creates a lot of air pollution. Yes, rockets emit a lot, but in the overall, less than automobiles when taking into the frequency of use into account: > Space shuttle fuel consumed in a launch: 3.5 million pounds. Gasoline consumed in one day in the US - 2,500 million pounds. In other words, one space shuttle launch is equivalent to about two minutes of gasoline consumption in the United States. [1] If we use rockets more often, then this would become a larger component of overall pollution. [1] http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2000-10/973014746.Es.r.html http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2000-10/973014746.Es.r....

dmurray 7y ago
The Space Shuttle didn't burn gasoline or exhaust carbon dioxide, it burnt hydrogen and exhausted water. So it didn't create meaningful air pollution when launched. Edit: actually it burnt both solid fuel and hydrogen, about 2.2 million pounds of the former.
- seiferteric 7y ago
  And where did the hydrogen come from?
- leetcrew 7y ago
  burning hydrogen at high temperatures in the atmosphere can create a good bit of NOx. not so bad when there aren't many rockets being launched, but not something you want a lot of.

bargl 7y ago

This is a complex computation to come up with. Ideally we could set up a mining operation that didn't require additional fuel from earth. That would be costly in CO2 if we used that as a measure. However, after being set up all that would be required for getting gold to earth from space would be de-orbiting the gold. I'm assuming that recovering a de-orbited chunk of gold would probably be cheaper than mining and transporting that gold on the surface of earth. While you are spot on to question the air pollution to get set up mining gold in space, it would require a really detailed analysis to figure out if it would be a net positive or negative for CO2 emissions. It would also need to be considered what happens when humans can start re-fueling spacecraft in space. What would that do to the shipping industry where materials are prevalent in space and can be moved to earth with minimal CO2 from earth.