4 ms·
You won't find climate change work at SpaceX.
by _moof 4y ago
You won't find climate change work at SpaceX.
- abledon 4y agowell indirectly, since a robust satellite infrastructure allows for daily imagery updates. Governments use this to more easily hold corporations accountable for their environmental day-to-day actions across the earth. Illegal deforestation? If a fleet of satellites is providing daily updates across the amazon, it is far more easily caught, rather than having it show up 2 weeks later after they have already cut out a chunk and left
- _moof 4y agoSpaceX's involvement in those missions ends when the payload separates from the second stage. You'd be very disappointed if you went there hoping to feel like you were making a meaningful impact on climate.
- uoaei 4y agoI recommend looking into the carbon emissions per-launch (or per-satellite if you prefer that accounting). It's bleak. Launching things into space is unsustainable and should be minimized.
- abledon 4y agoah perhaps, but doesnt seem that bad when compared to all the plane flights familys are taking for leisure, google hit https://www.inverse.com/innovation/are-rockets-environmentally-friendly https://www.inverse.com/innovation/are-rockets-environmental... > Current rocket launches have a negligible effect on total carbon emissions — Everyday Astronaut found they accounted for 0.0000059 percent of global carbon emissions in 2018, while the airline industry produced 2.4 percent the same year. > But the long-term effect is less clear, especially as companies like SpaceX move from hosting 26 launches in a year to 1,000 launches per rocket in a year. > “I think we can guess that rockets won't be a huge impact on the environment, and they probably won't stand out as a sole source of new problems,” Darin Toohey, professor at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences, tells Inverse. “But they will add to the growing list of activities that have negative impacts on the environment.”
- uoaei 4y agoOne thing being better than a second, worse thing does not automatically make the first thing good.
- abledon 4y agoVery true, I don't disagree that its not 100% pure and 'good', but I think space technology has a very important value in our society to explore, and is _especially_ important in solving problems for humanity down the line. As for Climate, without a healthy space industry, our climate observation tools would be set back decades. The first step to dealing with a problem is to become aware of it.
- uoaei 4y agoI guess the point is, maximize value per-launch, ideally as far in the net-negative direction as possible. I know that private companies do this already (it's kind of built in to the market of launch contract awards) but I am not sure private companies are going to be better in terms of climate vs well-funded public civilian space science agencies, because they are also incentivized to maximize the number of launches.
- badpun 4y agoIndirectly, even baker down my street is involved - government agents need to eat, and he provides them with bread.
- abledon 4y agohaha true, all humans depend on food to do their job, so working as a farmer is a catch-all for helping fight climate change
- pkdpic 4y agoI mean, if they get to mars they'll have to terraform it. And if they figure it out there then they can just do it here right? I thought that was all part of his master plan. Doesn't explain the flamethrowers but I'm sure they play a role too.