Getting that access to rural and/or impoverished areas is one of the great technology challenges of our time. Unfortunately, the people who’ve stepped up the most are those hoping to profit from humanity’s problems at any cost. Currently more than half of all operational satellites orbiting the Earth are SpaceX satellites. The vast majority of which were designed and launched with little or no consideration concerning how reflective they are. What does that mean, scientifically speaking? It means in the near future there will be no place on Earth from which any living being can gaze upon the naked night sky again. Ever. According to simulations from a team of Canadian astrophysicists (who specialize in research that’s currently being harmed by light pollution from big tech’s satellites), a whopping one in fifteen sources of light we see in the night sky will soon be artificial. Whether you’re standing at the North Pole, the South Pole, the equator, or anywhere in-between: the 65,000+ satellites that big tech companies plan to litter the sky with will ensure you never see the night sky again as your grandparents did. And, sadly, there’s no turning back. According to the Canadian research team, even if SpaceX and other companies continue to focus on designing less-reflective satellites, our view of the night sky is essentially changed forever. Per the team’s paper: Unfortunately, any expectations of “strong, international cooperation” and “appropriate regulation of satellite numbers” is pie-in-the-sky fantasy. There is simply no way to have tens of thousands of satellites in Low Earth Orbit and avoid consequences for astronomy. But with strong, international cooperation and appropriate regulation of satellite numbers, reflectivities, and satellite broadcasting, we can perhaps reach a compromise that allows much of research astronomy and traditional naked-eye stargazing to continue with minor losses. We may as well ask the US and Chinese governments to set their differences aside and become a single nation together. There’s a better chance of that happening than Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos deciding to regulate their own multi-billion (trillion! in the case of Bezos) dollar enterprises for the good of humanity. Worse, most of these satellites will only have a short lifespan. That means they’ll be regularly deorbited and replaced – and by “deorbited” we mean moved out of the way and left in the Earth’s upper atmosphere where they’ll become highly-reflective space trash. Per an article on Phys.Org by the paper’s lead author, astrophysicist Samantha Lawler: So let’s summarize: The mass of these satellites won’t go away—it will be deposited in the upper atmosphere. Because satellites comprise mostly aluminum alloys, they may form alumina particles as they vaporize in the upper atmosphere, potentially destroying ozone and causing global temperature changes. This has not yet been studied in-depth because low Earth orbit is not currently subject to any environmental regulations. On the bright side, however: Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are the richest people who have ever lived. You get to be a part of that. Our collective willingness to let these men destroy our natural resources is their greatest business asset. I can’t wait to see what else we’ll lose, as a species, in service of Elon and Jeff’s fortunes.
