SpaceX's 1 million satellite plan could change the night sky

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This is a CBC podcast, hello I'm Matt Galloway and this is the current podcast.

We've all had a moment gazing up at the night sky, maybe on a warm summer night, maybe

you're camping outside or you're coming home late after some time out with friends.

The way the sky looks today has changed significantly from even a decade ago.

That isn't part thanks to the number of satellites and the debris that they leave behind orbiting

our planet.

Now there is a new proposal by Elon Musk's SpaceX company that hopes to see one million

satellites launched into space.

Elon Musk cites the need for data centers that won't have an environmental impact here

on Earth.

Aaron Bowley is co-director at the Outer Space Institute, Professor of Physics and Astronomy

at the University of British Columbia, Aaron, good morning.

Good morning.

How many satellites are in space right now?

There are about 18,000 satellites in orbit about Earth and about 15,000 of those are active.

If we break it down into regions around Earth, then there are somewhere around 12,000, 14,000

that are in low Earth orbit.

That extends to about 1,000, 2,000 kilometers above the surface of Earth.

There's an image that often gets circulated on social media and it's of the Earth and

all of these things that are kind of zipping around above it and it just looks like static

in some ways.

Is that accurate?

Do you think in kind of a representation of what we're seeing?

I mean, it gives you that sense, this kind of behind this dust cloud that we're effectively

enclosing the Earth with.

The size scale that you have to have in order to have those visual representations each

dot, of course, is much larger.

In that sense, it doesn't give you the right interpretation, but in the sense of the number

of objects that are going up and the debris streams that are forming as a result of all

these activities, that is a real, a sensible interpretation of what's happening.

What happens if you put a million satellites?

There are a lot of different things that will happen.

At the moment, to really kind of give people a picture, just based on what the human

eye can see, if you look all around the sky, that in total, there are about 9,500 or so

stars that you could in principle see.

Now, in your local sky, you really only see about a third of those when you kind of take

into account the effects of the atmosphere and so forth and the horizon.

That's in a dark sky and after you've let your eyes really adjust.

However, we live in really light polluted areas, most of us.

If you're in kind of a suburban area, it goes from 3,000 stars that you can see locally

down to maybe 300, 400 or so.

If you live in a really urban environment, then that's even fewer.

We're really cutting ourselves off from the cosmos from terrestrial light pollution.

The effect that that has when you go to a really dark sky and for the first time really

see the cosmos is pretty inspiring.

It's amazing because suddenly you see then 1,000 more stars and you can see things like

the Milky Way galaxy that you couldn't see before.

You could see other galaxies that you couldn't see before.

What's happening then is as we're populating Earth's orbit with the satellites, you can't

see that effect when you're in the suburban environment.

At least not easily.

There are many satellites that you can see, but you can't see the total cumulative effect.

When you go to those dark skies, when you get away from that suburban environment, then

you could really see what's happening.

We are blanketing the sky with satellites and with debris.

SpaceX says that the need for these millions of satellites in part is removing the energy

impacts of data centers for things like AI.

You could use solar power and not drain the electricity grid down here on Earth.

Is that a good idea?

Well, I mean, there are problems with that scenario that's put forward.

I mean, on one hand, it is definitely correct to say that if you go into space and you

can have solar power provisioning, then the power needs with sufficient solar power panels

and with the right type of infrastructure within the satellite itself.

But there are a whole bunch of other problems that come into play.

You have to put all the satellites into orbit.

You have to keep them operating safely and when they do die and they will have a lifetime

associated with them, you have to do something with all of that.

What's happening is in order to launch the amount of mass that we're talking about, and

when they say a million satellites, they're talking about a ton each.

We're really talking about launching a million tons of satellites into orbit.

That means that you have very roughly speaking 20 million tons of fuel that you need to use

to launch that number of satellites and then you have to maintain it as well.

When those satellites reenter, they enter into the atmosphere and you want to get rid

of the satellites rather than leaving them in orbit because they become debris hazards.

Even if you could maneuver them perfectly, you can't maneuver them around meteorites

and so forth.

You want to get rid of them and one easy way to get rid of them relatively speaking is to

destroy them in the atmosphere, have them reenter, break apart and to find particulates.

That's treating the upper atmosphere as an incinerator and it's just polluting that region

of Earth and very consequentially.

You displace different types of impacts by trying to say, oh, well, I'm going to relieve some

energy demands by putting things into outer space, but really you're just displacing

the type of pollution that's produced.

It's not just the AI data centers and Starlink has just launched, apparently it's 10,000th

Starlink satellite system that's out there now and that internet connectivity has connected

people who were cut off previously in Canada's north and rural communities in Ukraine.

We're talking about people using Starlink in Iran, for example.

How do you balance that with the impacts that you're talking about?

No, it's a great question and it's one that we are all kind of struggling with in the

space community because there's no question that satellites are a very important part of

society.

It's not just SpaceX, it's not just SpaceX, it's not just SpaceX by any means, although

SpaceX now has more than half of the operational satellite well over half the operational satellites

in orbit, so they have become a very dominant actor in all of this, but there are all these

services that are provided that just really improve society and it goes from things such

as weather monitoring, search and rescue, provisioning, internet, communications, and so forth.

So there's a very long list, but that doesn't mean that all of the satellites that are

being proposed are ultimately needed, that orbital space is a finite resource and I know

we think of space being infinite, but the kind of operational region around Earth then

is something in which you can put so much stuff up there that you interfere with other

operations, that you limit your ability to continue operating, and that you cause other

types of damage such as impacts to the night sky, alterations to the upper atmosphere,

and literal impacts on other satellites through debris or the potential for satellite satellite

collisions and there's already been one in 2009.

So it is something that requires coordination, cooperation, and it's not something that

just has this infinite use case or something that should just be turned over to the whims

of one billionaire.

Indeed.

I have to let you go, we are out of time, but do you worry, we've all had those experiences

where you lay on the grass and you look up and you see the night sky and you actually

see it in a different way and you kind of described it there earlier.

Do you worry that that's going to be for future generations, that that won't be an experience

that they have?

It is something that I do worry about, that it's constantly being degraded, both by the

terrestrial light pollution as well as the orbital light pollution, and the big distinction

here is the terrestrial light pollution is something that we collectively can address and

do address at different levels.

The lights in our cities and towns and whatever.

Exactly.

But the lights that are due to reflected light are ultimately being put there by powerful

actors in just a few countries around the world, and so it's a lot harder to actually address

that type of impact.

But the cosmos is something that ultimately connects all of us, something that's familiar

yet alien.

It's exciting, yet terrifying, the processes that occur there, and it can be inspiring

and humbling.

It's something that's throughout society that's integrated our way of thinking.

And it would be ashamed to lose that?

Absolutely.

Aaron's good to talk to you about this.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for having me, Matt.

Aaron Bowley.

He was co-director at the Outer Space Institute at a professor of physics and astronomy at

the University of British Columbia.

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