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I've never heard anyone complain about filling the stratosphere with metal oxides, do you have somewhere I can read more about this risk? Naively, I would have

I've never heard anyone complain about filling the stratosphere with metal oxides, do you have somewhere I can read more about this risk? Naively, I would have expected that even thousands of 250kg satellites would be insignificant on the scale of the whole stratosphere (we're not talking about surface-level CO2, where we're pumping out gigatons per year), but I have no idea what that ecosystem is like. Is the metal oxide concentration measurable? I do think this is a temporary issue; once the cable ISP monopolies are no longer valuable because anyone can just get Starlink, that competitive pressure will push down hard on those cable monopolies and infrastructure laws will have to return to sanity. Terrestrial ISPs with fiber-sharing requirements and appropriate infrastructure build-out could absolutely out-compete Starlink, but right now they can just collude together and lobby against changing the status quo. I would much prefer to have a functional bureaucracy and intelligent, efficient infrastructure! But it's probably easier to fix that by launching the largest satellite constellation ever than by playing politics against some of the wealthiest media companies on the planet.

Clubber 3y ago
"Space junk," was a boogie man the news threw at the wall and didn't quite stick. Many of the pictures/diagrams of the satellites made them appear about 1000x bigger than they actually are. Example: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/space-junk https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/space-jun... Beware the murder hornets! https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/02/us/asian-giant-hornet-washington.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/02/us/asian-giant-hornet-was...
- chargingmarmot 3y ago
  I agree with the sentiment about media sensationalism but I don't think "space junk" is an issue we should be so quick to dismiss. Just because the problem hasn't gotten too bad yet doesn't mean it isn't real (especially because the problem involves a positive-feedback "domino effect" and junk might be infeasible to clean up). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome With regard to Starlink: I was a little bit concerned because of the large number of satellites they're putting up, but as far as I understand, Starlink isn't actually a big risk right now as far as space junk goes because the satellites orbit at low altitudes (340 miles) and are expected to naturally de-orbit relatively quickly due to atmospheric drag. (The decision to put them at low altitudes had to do with network latency.) If Elon were to say tomorrow, "hey we're moving Starlink out to 500 miles" I would hope some kind of regulation would be able to prevent that.
  - rini17 3y ago
    Everything we launch has to pass through these low altitudes. If these altitudes become full of debris we might have to stop all launches for several years [1] and no human presence at space for a bit longer. Quite scary, better to handwave it away "aint happen space is big". https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/59559/how-long-can-the-spacex-starlink-satellites-survive-before-they-deorbit https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/59559/how-long-can...
    - sliken 3y ago
      The starlink orbits are self cleaning, they are so low that without intervention things just slow down and fall out.
rini17 3y ago
We only have estimates, not yet complaints. Such as: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-89909-7 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-89909-7 That was always the thinking of all kinds of pollution that they are insignificant, till it "suddenly" became a problem and "everyone" was surprised. Well, if you're convinced it's inevitable then it is.

Clubber 3y ago

"Space junk," was a boogie man the news threw at the wall and didn't quite stick. Many of the pictures/diagrams of the satellites made them appear about 1000x bigger than they actually are. Example: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/space-junk https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/space-jun... Beware the murder hornets! https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/02/us/asian-giant-hornet-washington.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/02/us/asian-giant-hornet-was...

chargingmarmot 3y ago
I agree with the sentiment about media sensationalism but I don't think "space junk" is an issue we should be so quick to dismiss. Just because the problem hasn't gotten too bad yet doesn't mean it isn't real (especially because the problem involves a positive-feedback "domino effect" and junk might be infeasible to clean up). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome With regard to Starlink: I was a little bit concerned because of the large number of satellites they're putting up, but as far as I understand, Starlink isn't actually a big risk right now as far as space junk goes because the satellites orbit at low altitudes (340 miles) and are expected to naturally de-orbit relatively quickly due to atmospheric drag. (The decision to put them at low altitudes had to do with network latency.) If Elon were to say tomorrow, "hey we're moving Starlink out to 500 miles" I would hope some kind of regulation would be able to prevent that.
- rini17 3y ago
  Everything we launch has to pass through these low altitudes. If these altitudes become full of debris we might have to stop all launches for several years [1] and no human presence at space for a bit longer. Quite scary, better to handwave it away "aint happen space is big". https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/59559/how-long-can-the-spacex-starlink-satellites-survive-before-they-deorbit https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/59559/how-long-can...
  - sliken 3y ago
    The starlink orbits are self cleaning, they are so low that without intervention things just slow down and fall out.

rini17 3y ago

We only have estimates, not yet complaints. Such as: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-89909-7 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-89909-7 That was always the thinking of all kinds of pollution that they are insignificant, till it "suddenly" became a problem and "everyone" was surprised. Well, if you're convinced it's inevitable then it is.