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An entire launch worth of satellites is not a "rounding error." The carbon impact of just one launch is pretty obscene.
by KennyBlanken 5y ago
An entire launch worth of satellites is not a "rounding error."
The carbon impact of just one launch is pretty obscene.
- kant_adorn_arts 5y agoI think it is worth having a conversation about the actual numbers for carbon cost for launches, vs cost of other internet deployment technologies. Starlink is really cool but I want to know if I'm a fanatic or making rational decisions.
- oxplot 5y agoIn context of 1700 starlink satellites already in orbit and 30+ launches that put them there, it’s a rounding error. Same goes for carbon impact, etc.
- codeyperson 5y ago1700 - 40 = 1660. Rounded it to the nearest integer.
- cshimmin 5y agoIn scientific notation (orders of magnitude is what matters here): 1.700e3 rounded -> 2e3 1.660e3 rounded -> 2e3 Put another way: if your bill for lunch is $16.60, wouldn't you just as easily call it $17? Or even $20, if you're feeling a bit imprecise?
- oxplot 5y agoYes, where I live, a lot of businesses charge you credit card surcharge of 2-3%. That’s $17 for a $16.60 priced item.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Dylan16807 5y agoA falcon 9 uses about as much fuel as three transatlantic flights, doesn't it?
- lmm 5y ago> The carbon impact of just one launch is pretty obscene. It really isn't. It's what, 15 aeroplane flights' worth? For the sake of bringing internet to hundreds of thousands of people? By letting people shop online or stream entertainment they've probably paid for themselves in reduced car journeys already.
- KennyBlanken 5y agoYou're citing the cost of 1% of the network against the entire network's function. It's more like 750 "flights worth." To provide internet service to ~250,000 people - about one quarter the population of a major east coast city. Also, these are consumable - much more so than cable plants. Starlink is horrifically bad for the environment compared to ground-based infrastructure. As witnessed by the very high cost of Starlink service, which is likely losing mountains of cash despite that. > For the sake of bringing internet to hundreds of thousands of people? By letting people shop online or stream entertainment they've probably paid for themselves in reduced car journeys already. That's not how that works.
- colordrops 5y agoIndividual consumers aren't the only customers of Starlink. It also will bring high-bandwidth low-latency connectivity to the entire globe once enough laser-linked satellites are up. Industry and militaries will be using it. Whether this is a net positive for the environment or otherwise remains to be seen. Also, the point of Starlink is to fund SpaceX's goal of a methane rocket. Methane was chosen because it can be generated from atmospheric gases and solar power. The logistics around scaling it up remain to be solved, but once it is solved, rocket launches will be basically zero carbon.
- giomasce 5y agoIf you can extract methane from the atmosphere at scale you don't need rockets to solve the carbon problem.
- 5y ago
- Symmetry 5y agoA Falcon 9 caries just a bit more fuel than a fully loaded 777. Which is big, to be sure, but still a drop in the bucket just in terms of transportation.
- mlyle 5y agoThis isn't quite a fair comparison, though, because it doesn't consider the energy requirements to refine lox.
- maccam94 5y agoHow significant are those? 2x 777 flights worth? 10? There are thousands of airplane flights every day, but only a couple of these per month.
- Symmetry 5y agoIt takes about .7 MJ to refine a kg of lox, compared to 43 MJ released by a kg of kerosene. So that's not really a significant fraction.
- mlyle 5y agoIt's estimated that about 260g of CO2 is emitted per kg of liquid oxygen delivered to end users. And the oxidizer to fuel ratio is 2.5, so basically this doubles the impact. (And let's not get started on the rest of energy intensive things involved in space launch). Yes, space launch isn't ridiculously energy intensive, but it does put the 777 to shame.
- Symmetry 5y agoOk, so with each kg of kerosene burned emitting 3.6 kg of CO2 about 85% of a launch is due to the kerosene. Whether 15% is significant or not is in the eye of the beholder but I don't think my contention was unreasonable. There are, of course, ground crews and radars and tarmacs and so forth associated with a rocket launch but the same is true with a 777 flight as well. Most 777 flights aren't to the plane's max range, this is more of a Pacific crossing fuel consumption but I still think its broadly comparable. The big difference, I guess, is that a Falcon 9 might only make it through 10 or 20 flights while a 777 might do thousands. That is a big difference in energy usage but I don't feel competent to try to quantify it.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- ctdonath 5y agoThese launches are getting SpaceX the money to advance to methane-powered rockets: they will literally make rocket fuel out of air and sunlight, making them absolutely carbon neutral.
- kant_adorn_arts 5y agoIs the manufacture of biofuels actually carbon neutral? What about the massive deforestation of Indonesia - caused by Germany's biofuel mandate?
- MPSimmons 5y agoDoes shipping a rocket to Mars with enough propellant to make the trip and land when it gets there affect the balance? Every rocket to Mars carries hydrocarbon that will never come back.
- kant_adorn_arts 5y agoor is it not a biofuel? are they using the Sabatier reaction so they just need energy input (could be solar)?
- gpm 5y agoYes, the stated goal is the sabatier reaction from solar energy. The apparent purpose of this is pretty much a tech-demo for mars. In terms of minimizing environmental impact on earth it would pretty clearly be better just to send the solar energy to the grid and divert natural gas that would have gone to generating electricity to launching rockets.
- ctdonath 5y agoIn context - using solar energy to extract atmospheric CO2 and manufacture methane - yes. We're not discussing "massive deforestation" here. Germany's biofuel mandate does not affect rockets in Texas.
- SEJeff 5y agoISRU (what you're describing) does require a large amount of energy to do at scale. Also, ISRU has never been at the scale required to fully fuel a rocket. There is a decent writeup on wikipedia[1] on how difficult this would actually be to do ISRU on mars. The TL;DNR is 56,200 meters squared of thin film solar panels. Granted, solar power is roughly half as effective on mars as it is on earth, but still. For reference, an American Football field is 7,140 meters squared. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Mars_program#Mars_propellant_plant_and_base https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Mars_program#Mars_prope...
- paulcole 5y ago
- nyokodo 5y ago> The carbon impact of just one launch is pretty obscene. It isn’t really. Checkout Everyday Astronaut’s take on it: https://youtu.be/C4VHfmiwuv4 https://youtu.be/C4VHfmiwuv4