Astronomers urge FCC to halt satellite megaconstellation launches

Starlink satellites before deployment.
Starlink satellites before deployment. (Image credit: SpaceX)

Over 100 astronomers from leading U.S. universities have signed an open letter calling for an assessment of potential impacts of satellite megaconstellations on Earth's environment.

The researchers urge the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which approves satellite deployments in the U.S., to halt megaconstellation launches and conduct a thorough assessment of their possible environmental impacts before awarding further licenses.

U.S. government agencies are bound by the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA), which requires them to consider the environmental impacts of their decisions. A 1986 categorical exclusion, however, means that satellites are exempt from this requirement.

Researchers from leading U.S. universities including Harvard, Princeton and the University of California, Berkeley, are now calling for an end to this categorical exclusion.

Related: Can we solve the satellite air pollution problem? Here are 4 possible fixes

While just a few hundred satellites orbited Earth in 1986, the number has risen to nearly 10,000 today, and a further tenfold increase is expected in the next decade. This trend is driven mostly by the emerging satellite megaconstellations, such as SpaceX's Starlink, which promise to bridge the digital divide and provide people with no or insufficient connectivity with decent-quality internet.

Megaconstellation operators plan to regularly update their fleets with newer, more capable technology. To prevent the accumulation of space debris, they send the outdated spacecraft into Earth's atmosphere to burn up at the end of their mission. The potential harmful effects of this satellite incineration concern the researchers. In addition to that, the growing number of satellites in orbit disrupts astronomical observations, creating unwanted streaks in telescope images.

"Artificial satellites, even those invisible to the naked eye, can obstruct astronomical observations that help detect asteroids and understand our place in the universe," Robert McMillan, research professor of astronomy emeritus at the University of Arizona and one of the letter's authors, said in an emailed statement. "The potentially long-term environmental harms of deploying tens of thousands of satellites are still unclear."

Harvard University celebrity astrophysicist and extraterrestrial life researcher Avi Loeb is among the signatories of the letter. So are Jonathan McDowell, a leading space debris expert, satellite tracker and astronomer at Harvard Smithsonian; David Jewitt, the discoverer of the first Kuiper Belt object and distinguished professor of astronomy at UCLA; and space environmentalist Moriba Jah.

The U.S. nonprofit Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) conceived the letter following the release of its report detailing the potential hazards of satellite mass incineration in August.

PIRG estimates that when megaconstellation deployment reaches its peak, some 29 tons of metallic waste will be vaporizing in Earth's atmosphere every day, the equivalent of "a car falling from space" every hour.

Satellites are mostly made of aluminum, which forms aluminum oxide when burnt. Aluminum oxide, or alumina, contributes to ozone depletion and can alter the atmosphere's ability to absorb heat, thus affecting Earth's climate. Satellite reentries also produce nitrogen oxides, which, too, are known to damage ozone.

One of the satellites of the European Space Agency's Cluster constellation depicted by an artist reentering Earth's atmosphere.

Illustration of a satellite burning up during reentry.  (Image credit: ESA)

"The long-term effects of this massive change to our environment aren't clear," the scientists said in the letter. "We can bring the world online without the unknown environmental harms of satellite megaconstellations. The FCC should coordinate closely with the Environmental Protection Agency, NASA, and other national and international regulators to require extensive environmental reviews for the new space age. We're in a short window of time when we can prevent making a mess of space and our atmosphere rather than spend decades cleaning it up."

PIRG campaign director Lucas Gutterman, the main force behind the initiative, told Space.com in an email that the group has reached out to FCC Space Bureau Chief Julie Kearney, asking for a meeting to discuss the concerns expressed in the letter.

"We're continuing to work with experts to bring their concerns to the FCC and lawmakers in D.C.," Gutterman wrote. "The space industry has moved faster than the public or regulators were able to keep up, and we'll continue to raise the importance of this issue with the public. The speed and scale of the new space race should be a kitchen-table issue, not an esoteric discussion among a small group of industry insiders."

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Tereza Pultarova
Senior Writer

Tereza is a London-based science and technology journalist, aspiring fiction writer and amateur gymnast. Originally from Prague, the Czech Republic, she spent the first seven years of her career working as a reporter, script-writer and presenter for various TV programmes of the Czech Public Service Television. She later took a career break to pursue further education and added a Master's in Science from the International Space University, France, to her Bachelor's in Journalism and Master's in Cultural Anthropology from Prague's Charles University. She worked as a reporter at the Engineering and Technology magazine, freelanced for a range of publications including Live Science, Space.com, Professional Engineering, Via Satellite and Space News and served as a maternity cover science editor at the European Space Agency.

  • Darklurker
    Better late than never, I suppose...
    Reply
  • Classical Motion
    Too late now.
    Reply
  • Unclear Engineer
    The FCC could only halt U.S. megaconstellations. So, we would still have constellations of satellites from other countries, including China, Russia, maybe Europe, maybe India.

    So, unless there is at least a UN based treaty to not launch megaconstellations, the U.S. would just be shipping more of our technological base to other countries. And, without some means of enforcing a UN treaty, it could still prove useless for achieving a no-megaconstellation result.

    Probably more feasible to try to get agreement on things like reflectivity and frequency leakage rates to at least minimize the undesirable effects.

    But, given the amount of plain "light pollution" that continues to increase on the ground, decades after it was identified as wasteful, I don't have much hope for avoiding the orbiting analog.
    Reply
  • Classical Motion
    We need to put our detectors on the far side. It's the only quiet and clear space left.
    Reply
  • Unclear Engineer
    Classical Motion said:
    We need to put our detectors on the far side. It's the only quiet and clear space left.
    Agreed.

    But, building infrastructure on the far side of the Moon is going to take some time. I would not expect something better than Webb there before 2040, and that is optimistic. And, it will be expensive to maintain and operate.

    And, part of the infrastructure will probably involve Moon-orbiting satellites for positioning and communications around the Moon to Earth, so still not totally quiet.
    Reply
  • 24launch
    Avi Loeb has lost nearly all credibility in the scientific community with his crazy obsession with Aliens and claims of fact with zero evidence, so using him has a primary source for yet another one of Ms Pultarova's "The sky is falling / satellites are destroying the planet / stop SpaceX at all costs" articles really doesn't help her argument.

    Loeb claims that "Godlike aliens may be creating universes in labs":
    https://futurism.com/the-byte/avi-loeb-alien-labs
    In 2014 Loeb claimed that spherules found at the bottom of the ocean were created by aliens:
    https://medium.com/starts-with-a-bang/the-humiliating-truth-behind-harvard-astronomers-alien-spherules-e9d0db88a0c4#:~:text=Unfortunately%2C%20there's%20a%20much%20more,were%20found%20in%20Loeb's%20samples.&text=In%20fact%2C%20Patricio%20Gallardo%20was,with%20the%20coal%20ash%20standard.
    In 2017 he has claimed that the strange cigar-shaped interstellar object named Oumuamua was unequivocally created and sent by an extra solar alien intelligence:
    https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/astronomer-avi-loeb-says-aliens-have-visited-and-hes-not-kidding1/
    Sure, it's one thing to have an open mind but not so open your brains fall out and unfortunately it appears that absolute obsession had caused this once brilliant scientist to lose his sense of rationality and abandon the very scientific principles he once cherished.

    And as Unclear Engineer pointed out, the US is not alone with building out Satellite megaconstallations, something Ms Pultarova frequently leaves out from her anti-SpaceX "articles".
    Reply
  • fj.torres
    Unclear Engineer said:
    The FCC could only halt U.S. megaconstellations. So, we would still have constellations of satellites from other countries, including China, Russia, maybe Europe, maybe India.

    So, unless there is at least a UN based treaty to not launch megaconstellations, the U.S. would just be shipping more of our technological base to other countries. And, without some means of enforcing a UN treaty, it could still prove useless for achieving a no-megaconstellation result.

    Probably more feasible to try to get agreement on things like reflectivity and frequency leakage rates to at least minimize the undesirable effects.

    But, given the amount of plain "light pollution" that continues to increase on the ground, decades after it was identified as wasteful, I don't have much hope for avoiding the orbiting analog.
    Europe is a certainty.
    Russia is a probably not and China is yes for now but no certainty after 2030.
    India will be a regional yes.

    Thing is, if the pundits stop SpaceX and Amazon, Japan, Indonesia, Brazil, Australia and several other countries will still be able to hire somebody to build them a regional constellation. They absolutely need one. And if they can sign up to an international one, they'll need a national one.

    The fact is the tech is too valuable, too reliable, and too cheap to wave off.

    And even if the activists manage to stop Starlink and Kuiper, they'll never stop Starshield.
    Suck it up folks, the djinn is not going back into the bottle.

    What they need to be looking at is using Starship to build a network or three around the Lagrangians using Interferometry telescopes. Don't even need to go to the moon for that.

    Look forward, not back.
    Reply
  • James Parker
    Since when are astronomers the preeminent experts on climatology? I understand how megaconstellations will hinder astronomy. Clearly, the benefits outweigh this unfortunate side-effect. It sounds like astronomers know this and some are trying to pull in the far-more-serious matter of ozone depletion to bolster their case. However, we would need to check with climatologists. If it's real, then we'll need deal with it internationally for reasons others have stated.

    24Launch brought up a good point: Tereza Pultarova is trying to disrupt this trend through her journalism. Half of her recent articles are devoted to various "dangers" of megaconstellations. I'm not sure she's being fair to the industry.
    Reply
  • monkeyonmars
    I like taking astrophotos and don't mind the streaks. Of course my livelyhood does not depend on photographing the sky. Realistically, it isn't going to stop. So get Musk to launch us a lot of space observatory satellites mounted with smart telescopes, he owes us.
    Reply