STARLINK VS. STARGAZERS

I suppose the course of progress has never run smoothly. Just look at the myriad ways we’ve screwed up our planet and all of its living species while trying to improve the lot of our own.

One of the newest examples is SpaceX’s ambitious plans for their Starlink internet service, intended to bring affordable high-speed satellite internet to even the most remote parts of our nations. As someone who lives in a rural area, poorly served by internet providers, this seemed like a great step forward to me. It didn’t cross my mind that it would conflict with my love of gazing into the night-time sky.

So far, SpaceX has launched more than 700 of their small Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit, has permission to launch 12,000, and plans to launch a total of 30,000. That’s a lot of metallic objects whizzing overhead! They call it a “mega-constellation”, and that cutesy name probably fits better than they intended because, just like the original constellations, the Starlink satellites can be seen, thanks to the solar panels they depend on for energy.

Have you ever watched a satellite speed overhead while you’re stargazing on a clear night? It’s interesting—not really an impediment. But what if you were seeing dozens of them like beads on a string? That could get annoying. Now imagine you’re a professional astronomer taking long-exposure pictures of the night sky in hopes of discovering new space objects like asteroids or comets, or learning new information about other star systems. Annoying doesn’t cover it. Infuriating maybe. And that’s exactly what astronomers have been facing since the Starlink launches began. In fact, the disruption may not affect only optical astronomy; the creators of a new radio-telescope array in South Africa complain that the Starlink satellites will broadcast on one of the frequencies they hope to survey in the search for organic molecules elsewhere in the galaxy.

Now, I’m sure none of this was ever intended by SpaceX engineers—the satellites are brighter than expected—and the company is trying some things to remedy the problem. They’ve made the satellites much darker and less reflective (I’ve never seen one, but apparently the first few hundred are visible to the naked eye) and added visors to block the most reflective components, but scientists say these measures aren’t nearly enough. Other possible solutions are being discussed. Meantime the satellites keep going up. And at least two other companies plan to launch large numbers of similar satellites in the coming years.

I’m sure that every satellite ever launched has interfered with some astronomer’s observations, but the Starlink plans elevate the problem to a whole new scale, and it will only get worse. Why? Because now that private industries like SpaceX, Blue Origin (owned by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos), and others are gaining a foothold in space, Low Earth Orbit will become the new frontier of manufacturing and even tourism. As I’ve said many times, as soon as the cost of launching materials beyond the atmosphere drops below a certain threshold, any number of space-based industries will become profitable, and private companies are steadily bringing that cost down. Everything from pharmaceutical laboratories and medical treatment facilities to hotels and habitats for the aged (and very wealthy!) will be put up there. There will be orbiting factories to produce super-conductive fibreoptic cable, semi-conductors, replacement human organs, exotic alloys and metallic glasses for a huge variety of applications, and who knows what else?

The next step will be staging platforms for deeper space travel, whether to the Moon, the asteroids, Mars, or beyond, since long-range spacecraft will be assembled in orbit and begin their journeys there. Traffic like that will steadily increase, leaving trails of ionized gases across the sky.

Precision optical astronomy based on the surface of the Earth is probably doomed. The writing is already on the wall.

That doesn’t mean the end of astronomy, of course. It will be a case of “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em”. We already know that telescopes and other scientific instruments can view the heavens with vastly improved precision once beyond the pesky interference of the Earth’s atmosphere. For now, the choice of whether to observe from a mountaintop or high above the ocean of air comes down to cost (and maybe convenience), but before much longer, there won’t be a choice. The sky near Earth will simply be too crowded.

I hope these changes won’t entirely spoil the pleasure of lying on your back under the sky on a summer night and wondering at a billion blazing points of light. There are few experiences more glorious.

Astronomers, I feel your pain.