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Earth Space

Inventory Counts Air Pollution Cost of Space Launches and Re-Entries 66

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: A new global inventory has catalogued air pollution from space activities from 2020 to 2022. The inventory includes time, position and pollution from 446 launchers as they ascended and the tracks of re-entries as objects are heated to extreme temperatures and break up or burn up in the upper atmosphere. It catalogues the pollution from 63,000 tons of rocket propellants used in 2022 and from 3,622 objects, including rocket parts and satellites, that re-entered the atmosphere between 2020 and 2023, amounting to about 12,000 tons. [...]

Types of launch pollutants depend on the propellent but can include particles of soot and aluminum oxides as well as nitrogen oxides, chlorine and water vapour and carbon dioxide. Extreme heat on re-entry causes atmospheric oxygen and nitrogen to combine to form more nitrogen oxides and also produces tiny metal-oxide particles as the objects break and burn up. Soot emitted high in the atmosphere can persist for several years, with a resulting climate warming impact that is up to 500 times greater than the same amount of soot from aviation or ground-level sources. Aluminum oxide particles, nitrogen oxides and chloride can consume the ozone in the stratosphere that protects us from the sun's ultraviolet radiation. These can remain in the atmosphere for decades.
Dr Connor Barker, of the UCL team, said: "Many rocket manufacturers and space agencies keep this information tightly controlled. We had to be creative about the different sources we consulted, from launch live streams on YouTube to online databases maintained by space enthusiasts in their spare time."
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Inventory Counts Air Pollution Cost of Space Launches and Re-Entries

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  • Is it supposed to be general knowledge what a "global inventory" is?
    • Here's how to use your general knowledge: Take these two common English words (one adjective and one noun), combine them in the obvious way, and you can determine the meaning of the phrase.

      • I really don't understand what the word inventory is doing here. Is there like one official list of all things in the globe and someone just updated a new version?
        • If you'd bother to read two dozen words of TFS past the phrase in question, you'd find this:

          The inventory includes time, position and pollution from 446 launchers

          Once again, use the ordinary meaning of those words to determine what kind of inventory they are talking about.

          • Measuring pollution from mainly government funded rocket launches is progress.

            Exempting the largest polluters on the planet, federal governments in the largest countries, from any real regulatory discussion on pollution has been a mistake.

            Governments such as the US federal one are the biggest consumers on the planet and produce immense amounts of pollution and should be the first required to make changes to meet any new pollution lowering commitments. State and local governments next and then 10 years late

    • My fish Freddy's bowl is a globe shape. Must an inventory of the fish bowl.

      bowl
      rocks
      plant
      dihydrogen monoxide
      Freddy

      I had no idea that Freddy was doing Space Launches and Re-entries. Thank god someone is tracking this.

    • An 'inventory' can be the act of taking stock of what you have. So a Global Inventory is cataloging all launches and reentries globally.

    • by Anonymous Coward
      inventory - a complete list of items such as property, goods in stock, or the contents of a building.
    • I quit reading after that.
      • by dryeo ( 100693 )

        Anything can be a pollutant when it is somewhere it creates adverse affects or in large enough quantities to create adverse affects. In the case of water vapor, it is introducing it into the very dry upper atmosphere where it may cause a greenhouse effect and interact with the ozone destroying it.

    • by gweihir ( 88907 )

      It is easy. Here, let me help you: 1. Take the first word. "Global" means for the whole planet. If you do not know that, you can look it up in a dictionary or even ask ChatGPT or the like! 2. Take the second word. It is "inventory". An "Inventory" is when you count or quantify something. Again, a dictionary or ChatAI will help you of you do not know that. Now look closely. The first word actually defines a _scope_, i.e. what the thing following it is applied to. And there you have it: A "global inventory" i

  • That's it (Score:1, Insightful)

    by christoban ( 3028573 )

    Now we have to stop sending up rockets to satisfy silly short term "environmentalist" goals. The same "environmentalists" who have put in so many regulatory delays and roadblocks to make building nuclear reactors 4 times slower and more expensive than they need to be?

    I will continue to put "environmentalist" in quotes every time, until they stop killing the only realistically path to ending climate change.

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      That's because you're talking about Greens. Greens are not environmentalists. They are the people who killed the environmentalist movement from inside.

      • Greens are people who shut down nuclear power stations in Germany to use more brown coal.
        • Greens are people who shut down nuclear power stations in Germany to use more brown coal.

          Just adding this -->> Use more brown coal cuz it is a natural product of Mother Nature herself, like trees & wind? Inquiring minds want to know.

          • Lot's of things are naturally occurring but that doesn't mean it's good for us as humans or the planet in general. Also, the coal itself isn't the problem, but when we use it as fuel, it begins to release carbon which then lingers in our atmosphere. The same would be true if we were busy cutting down trees to burn for warmth. That doesn't make trees harmful just like coal isn't harmful but once we start doing stuff with it, the equation changes.

            • by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

              Coal burning isn't primarily harmful because of carbon. That's a pretty minor concern compared to things like mercury emissions. A lot of sea life cannot be consumed in large amounts without causing nerve and brain damage any more in certain areas because of coal burning. That alone has a far, far greater "damage to actual human beings" profile than global warming had to date.

              Add to this damage from acid rains and particulates (which we now control for, but didn't use to), and CO2 isn't even a blip on a rad

    • That's a nice cave that you have there. I see that you changed the decor recently.

      Yeah. We moved some rocks around and planted a garden so we can have Midnight Munchies. Look at these cool antique animal paintings over here in the art niche!

  • THe quantities are ALREADY assayed.
    What's being done is the pseudo-envronmental wonks are now totting it up on the front end AND the back end.

  • Scale matters (Score:5, Informative)

    by Guspaz ( 556486 ) on Saturday November 02, 2024 @12:30AM (#64914109)

    So, we're using 63,000 tons of rocket fuel per year. How does that compare to the ~73,000 tons of fuel that a *single* large container ship would use in a year?

    We have a few hundred rocket launches per year. But there are thousands of container ships. And tens of thousands of aircraft. And billions of cars.

    • Re:Scale matters (Score:5, Insightful)

      by dvice ( 6309704 ) on Saturday November 02, 2024 @12:54AM (#64914121)

      Exactly. And it doesn't really matter if we save the world from pollution if we can't stop an asteroid hitting Earth, so developing rocket technology is environmental friendly.

      • Exactly. And it doesn't really matter if we save the world from pollution if we can't stop an asteroid hitting Earth, so developing rocket technology is environmental friendly.

        Sure would be one hell of a reason to let every ICBM off the chain in an ironic display of actual nuclear arms reduction.

        (Not like we’ll have much of a choice but to toss every kitchen sink at that problem. Even the nukes are reduced to not-gonna-need-these-anymore status when the asteroid is coming.)

        • Not to mention, how many of our nukes will even still work? Nothing last forever and I doubt they are all being maintained, especially not the Russian ones.

    • So, we're using 63,000 tons of rocket fuel per year. How does that compare to the ~73,000 tons of fuel that a *single* large container ship would use in a year?

      We have a few hundred rocket launches per year. But there are thousands of container ships. And tens of thousands of aircraft. And billions of cars.

      Agreed. Does a decade of space launches, add up to even a single year of additional pollution introduced by Return To Office mandates? Congesting roadways with millions of tailpipes, is what got us here. WFH was..no IS, an environmental godsend. RTO is ignorant at best and evil at worst when addressing sources of pollution that can be mitigated.

      In retort, space might just become the new Blame Frontier. Less people understand how it works, so less to call bullshit on the finger-blaming lies from those p

    • Hey now, do not confuse climate fanatics with facts. You do not know what they will come up with next.
    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      As the summary mentions, the effect it has is worse in the upper atmosphere. Hundreds of times worse.

      It's getting worse too, as more and more launches take place. Rather than do what we usually do and wait until it is causing catastrophic climate change, why don't we start thinking about it now and put in some incentives to develop cleaner rockets?

      We should do something about shipping too.

      • by Guspaz ( 556486 )

        Even if it's hundreds of times worse, it's still tiny compared to something like cars or air travel. There are easy viable alternatives to make cleaner cars and aircraft. There aren't really any viable alternatives to chemical rockets, certainly for anything remotely delicate (like people).

        SpaceX today represents the vast majority of the global launch market (87% last quarter), so let's just consider them. They're currently working on developing Starship, which will ultimately replace Falcon 9, even for sma

  • by SubmergedInTech ( 7710960 ) on Saturday November 02, 2024 @01:45AM (#64914165)

    12,000 tons of satellites and debris (mostly rocket parts) over 3 years.

    NASA says over 100 tons of space dust enters the atmosphere every day. That's over 100,000 tons in that time.

    • Some of that debris may actually be blocking some incoming sunlight, so maybe it's not all contributing to global warming. I'm not a rocket scientist though, so I may be incorrect.

    • So which would you rather have screaming into the atmosphere at a few thousand kps...dust, or chunks of matter weighing 100 or 200 kg each?

      • So which would you rather have screaming into the atmosphere at a few thousand kps...dust, or chunks of matter weighing 100 or 200 kg each?

        Both cause the same air pollution, which is the topic we're on.

        And yes, there are occasionally much bigger chunks. Just this one was equal to all of the man-made stuff from those 3 years combined: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

  • And? (Score:2, Troll)

    by TJHook3r ( 4699685 )
    Are you telling me that sending billionaires into space for bragging rights might actually be bad for the environment?
  • by sarren1901 ( 5415506 ) on Saturday November 02, 2024 @09:20AM (#64914535)

    against Musk for driving the space industry forward? I think Tesla is more then offsetting the pollution caused by rocket launches. With so many other areas we can do better on, this is just ridiculous. The expansion of our space industry is important for the future of our species and we're sure as heck are not going to be using batteries to get to space.

    Why doesn't the Guardian write a piece on the amount of pollution hosting the Internet and world wide web are costing us? I mean, just them posting this article is causing global warming if you bother to go read the article. I guess they are buying carbon offsets, but that doesn't actually prevent carbon from entering the atmosphere. That's just trying to greenwashing the activity.

  • The authors ( actual only one was a geochemist ) diligently avoid any discussion of alternative sources of their indicators, or the simple fallacy that correlation doesn't mean causation. "During the peak climactic phase of the 2022 Hunga volcano eruption, the upper part of the plume reached 57 km3 injecting aerosols into the mesosphere. The impact of these aerosols and salts at such high atmospheric levels is not well known, but postulated effects include ozone destruction, radiative forcing and climate wa
    • "Analysis of physicochemical processes in volcanic column showed the possibility of formation of the following types of black carbon particles: single highly dispersed particles or their small fractal aggregates, particles of fibrous or encapsulate types associated with pyroclasts, graphite-like pyrocarbon particles.Moreover, the formation of particles of the second and third types is energetically more accessible than that of the first type. Data on the detection of carbonceous particles in the stratospher

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