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Despite Elon's perpetual over promises, starship is the closest thing humanity has to getting to Mars, and it is an impressive feat of engineering. Elon can be

Despite Elon's perpetual over promises, starship is the closest thing humanity has to getting to Mars, and it is an impressive feat of engineering. Elon can be an asshole and also own the best piece of space hardware out there There is also a big difference between cant get orbital and won't (yet) get orbital. They pretty clearly can get orbital because their current route gets 99% of the way they. They actively choose not to because it's a test vehicle and if something goes wrong they don't want to have uncontrolled reentry. Also the hydrocarbons you mention are not even a rounding error in any sort of count that matters, so there is no real destruction of ecosystems

oskarkk 1y ago
I think greekrich92 when talking about "destroying the South TX ecosystem" meant their huge rocket production and launch site right next to some protected ecologically valuable areas in south Texas. The extent of the damage is debatable, they are of course legally required to minimize impacts, and even to do things like monitoring the state of the wildlife in the area, and they passed environmental reviews under both Biden's and Trump's administrations. Anyway, if anyone would want to build a new launch site, it must be on the coast, as near the equator as possible (for launch efficiency because of Earth's rotation), and as far from populated areas as possible, and that correlates with ecologically valuable regions. So that's the cost of progress.
- panick21_ 1y ago
  Pretty much everybody know that launch site and exclusion zones for human are great for wildlife. Turns out, what is destroying the environment is humans living in places, large areas with few humans usually do pretty well. But instead of focusing on that, we need to test if dolphins get hearing damage from rockets. > So that's the cost of progress Its actually the benefit of progress. The cost of progress is having to close the beach and having to relocate a small village.
  - oskarkk 1y ago
    It's obvious that before SpaceX moved in, 6 permanent residents of that little village weren't damaging that environment more than today's thousands of people working on a huge industrial site built in place of that village (and now 500 people are actually living in Starbase). SpaceX activity in that area obviously has some environmental costs, like every other industrial activity or any human settlement. The cost of human progress. Btw, it was a seal[0][1], not a dolphin ;) [0] https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320421724644573184 https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320421724644573184 [1] https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320422298618302464 https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320422298618302464
    - inemesitaffia 1y ago
      We have video and pictures from the time pre SpaceX with abandoned tires and more littering the area. It's cleaner there now and will get even cleaner

oskarkk 1y ago

I think greekrich92 when talking about "destroying the South TX ecosystem" meant their huge rocket production and launch site right next to some protected ecologically valuable areas in south Texas. The extent of the damage is debatable, they are of course legally required to minimize impacts, and even to do things like monitoring the state of the wildlife in the area, and they passed environmental reviews under both Biden's and Trump's administrations. Anyway, if anyone would want to build a new launch site, it must be on the coast, as near the equator as possible (for launch efficiency because of Earth's rotation), and as far from populated areas as possible, and that correlates with ecologically valuable regions. So that's the cost of progress.

panick21_ 1y ago
Pretty much everybody know that launch site and exclusion zones for human are great for wildlife. Turns out, what is destroying the environment is humans living in places, large areas with few humans usually do pretty well. But instead of focusing on that, we need to test if dolphins get hearing damage from rockets. > So that's the cost of progress Its actually the benefit of progress. The cost of progress is having to close the beach and having to relocate a small village.
- oskarkk 1y ago
  It's obvious that before SpaceX moved in, 6 permanent residents of that little village weren't damaging that environment more than today's thousands of people working on a huge industrial site built in place of that village (and now 500 people are actually living in Starbase). SpaceX activity in that area obviously has some environmental costs, like every other industrial activity or any human settlement. The cost of human progress. Btw, it was a seal[0][1], not a dolphin ;) [0] https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320421724644573184 https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320421724644573184 [1] https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320422298618302464 https://x.com/TalulahRiley/status/320422298618302464
  - inemesitaffia 1y ago
    We have video and pictures from the time pre SpaceX with abandoned tires and more littering the area. It's cleaner there now and will get even cleaner