3 ms·

To what degree, I wonder, does this negatively impact our atmosphere, pollutionwise

by 0des 5y ago

AnimalMuppet 5y ago
Very close to zero. The earth's atmosphere is bigger than 5 * 10e18 kilograms. Burning up a satellite's worth of debris is a non-event.
toss1 5y ago
This one event? I'd be mildly surprised if it were even detectable, other than the brief fireball. There is a constant rain of meteors and meteorids - estimated 139/day more than 10 grams hit the surface of the earth every day [1]. I don't know how many more thousands of small bits burn up every day without ever coming close to the ground. So, I'd say it is at least far down in that noise. Also, if the total mass of the satellite is a ton, vaporizing all if it in the atmosphere would make make a change of less than one part per 1000 trillion, considering that the atmosphere weighs, 5.5 quadrillion tons[2]. So maybe if it was all made of some element that is very rare in the atmosphere, it might get up to a 1-in-a-trillion concentration when it all burned up? But then, it also is now scattered all over so won't even burn up at once, so heavy elements from the first chunks may have already settled out from by the time the later ones arrive. There's no way I can concoct anything that it is an atmospheric pollution risk. But space pollution, we might be talking Kessler Syndrome [3]; I don't think this will do it, but I'm worried. [1] https://universeexplained.com/how-many-meteorites-hit-the-earth-every-day/ https://universeexplained.com/how-many-meteorites-hit-the-ea... [2] https://www.britannica.com/story/how-much-does-earths-atmosphere-weigh https://www.britannica.com/story/how-much-does-earths-atmosp... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome
tomrod 5y ago
Low and negligible. The volume in orbit is dangerous but small. Like pellets from a shotgun across several football fields.
TaylorAlexander 5y ago
IMO people should not downvote you for genuinely asking a question.
- 0des 5y ago
  Try not to let it bother you, it's not like you can spend them. When it does rub me the wrong way is when it is without some type of rebuttal or explainer as to why it's a bad comment.
mhh__ 5y ago
Not very much at all, if you had some kind of RTG burn up in the atmosphere then that might be a different story (although still nowhere near enough to make the atmosphere polluted as opposed to giving some people on the ground a really bad day)
yread 5y ago
So far the only satellite that caused significant pollution was Kosmos 954 that had an onboard nuclear reactor and after deorbiting spread it over 600km of Canada. USSR was fined 6M for the cleanup.

To what degree, I wonder, does this negatively impact our atmosphere, pollutionwise

by 0des 5y ago

To what degree, I wonder, does this negatively impact our atmosphere, pollutionwise

Very close to zero. The earth's atmosphere is bigger than 5 * 10e18 kilograms. Burning up a satellite's worth of debris is a non-event.

toss1 5y ago

This one event? I'd be mildly surprised if it were even detectable, other than the brief fireball. There is a constant rain of meteors and meteorids - estimated 139/day more than 10 grams hit the surface of the earth every day [1]. I don't know how many more thousands of small bits burn up every day without ever coming close to the ground. So, I'd say it is at least far down in that noise. Also, if the total mass of the satellite is a ton, vaporizing all if it in the atmosphere would make make a change of less than one part per 1000 trillion, considering that the atmosphere weighs, 5.5 quadrillion tons[2]. So maybe if it was all made of some element that is very rare in the atmosphere, it might get up to a 1-in-a-trillion concentration when it all burned up? But then, it also is now scattered all over so won't even burn up at once, so heavy elements from the first chunks may have already settled out from by the time the later ones arrive. There's no way I can concoct anything that it is an atmospheric pollution risk. But space pollution, we might be talking Kessler Syndrome [3]; I don't think this will do it, but I'm worried. [1] https://universeexplained.com/how-many-meteorites-hit-the-earth-every-day/ https://universeexplained.com/how-many-meteorites-hit-the-ea... [2] https://www.britannica.com/story/how-much-does-earths-atmosphere-weigh https://www.britannica.com/story/how-much-does-earths-atmosp... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome

tomrod 5y ago

Low and negligible. The volume in orbit is dangerous but small. Like pellets from a shotgun across several football fields.

TaylorAlexander 5y ago

IMO people should not downvote you for genuinely asking a question.

0des 5y ago
Try not to let it bother you, it's not like you can spend them. When it does rub me the wrong way is when it is without some type of rebuttal or explainer as to why it's a bad comment.

mhh__ 5y ago

Not very much at all, if you had some kind of RTG burn up in the atmosphere then that might be a different story (although still nowhere near enough to make the atmosphere polluted as opposed to giving some people on the ground a really bad day)

yread 5y ago

So far the only satellite that caused significant pollution was Kosmos 954 that had an onboard nuclear reactor and after deorbiting spread it over 600km of Canada. USSR was fined 6M for the cleanup.