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Not like you don't have enough things to worry about, but check this out, folks.
You know, daily life.
Increasingly depends on systems of satellite satellites orbiting the Earth.
As fleets proliferate, every greater.
Numbers of expired units will ultimately hurtle back towards the surface. They're coming back down, So what could possibly go wrong? I got to say this is the subject today at Bloomberg's Big Take. It means the Bloomberg editorial team has said this is.
A must read. It is also among the most read stories on the Bloomberg, And I.
Got to say it's a story that should be experienced online or on the Bloomberg because it's just very cool in terms of the graphics and images and animations that a company.
All Right, So let's get to it.
A team of reporters worked on it, led by Bloomberg News Sustainability editor Eric Roston, he joins us here in studio, also with us as Bloomberg News space reporter Sana Pussienkart, she is in Washington, d C.
All right, guys, incredible, we've all been talking about this story.
It's a little terrifying. Eric, Why don't you set this scene. We know that there are a lot of satellites in space, and we're talking about a lot of times.
There are a lot of smaller satellites. We know we really need them.
Lay it all out for us, give us some size and scope here and what we're feeling, what we're dealing with.
Sure, so we've been sending up ever more satellites since the advent several years ago of satellite Internet services, obviously with Starlink being the pretty far ahead of all the others. And we've all read stories over the years of space junk, and there's so much stuff that we've sent into orbit that there's increase in concern that something might hit something else and then you'll have screws flying around twenty thousand
miles an hour. Nobody wants that. So, knowing that all these satellites were going up, they were built according to what's called a designed for demise strategy basically at the.
End of the like a plan to obsolescence in space one hundred percent.
Yeah, and like these things last like five years, and so they deorbit them and they just let the atmosphere burn them up. And the thing, the funny thing about burning something up is like you don't get rid of it's the particles that make it up. So all those particles that used to be in the satellite are just going to become a part of the atmosphere. And that's kind of been fine in over the decades as we've
deorbited things and burned them up the atmosphere. But given the projections of how many satellites are going to go up and how many are going to have to come out of orbit every day, they're looking at a seating of the top of the atmosphere with a number of substances that could lead to further deterioration of the ozone layer, which is this this gaseous layer that hangs in the stratosphere and protects living things from the Sun's ultra violet race.
Basically, we're allowed to live right survive because we have the ozone layer.
Yeah, it's a little.
Important, it's pretty important. And so there's and the neat thing about the science that is coming out now is like it's not a problem yet. Like one thing that I think has overlooked a lot about some of these like big systemic planetary problems is like, even though they're like they seem huge and unmanageable to us, like you know, a big rock in space with it like atmosphere around it is kind of easy to model for the physicists.
And so they've gotten pretty good over the last fifty to one hundred years of saying, hey, if we keep adding these materials like this is probably going to happen. So we're getting the alert just when we need it most in just when the industry and governments can decide how they want to cope with the issue.
So, Sona, let's bring you in here. Maybe you could just describe to us what actually happens. There's a satellite, you know, it's deconstructing I guess we could call it, and it's falling from the sky, Like what is going on with the satellite itself? And then in the atmosphere when this is taking place.
Yeah, so they're basically the satellites when.
They are diorbited at the end of their life span, they basically disintegrate upon re entry, so the atmosphere kind of pulls them in and they burn up in the fiery atmosphere and they release materials like aluminium and other metals and that, as Eric mentioned, it can potentially alter the chemical composition of the upper atmosphere and it could
also you know, deplete the ozone layer. And as Eric mentioned, and you know that the research is still it's still new, it's still burgeoning, but that is what scientists are saying. And you know, it's especially important because this issue is only supposed to get more extreme as the number.
Of satellites are expected to project.
So right now, the amount of satellites and the amison in orbit have basically followed like a hockey puck trend, soy they keep.
Every single year, there's been like for that.
I think at the past five or six years, there's been a record number of satellites going up. And you know, there's some projections that there's you know, around twelve thousand today and that could go up to between nearly sixty thousand to one hundred thousand.
In about five years. That's nuts exactly.
So with that all those satellites have to come down at some point. So that's why, you know, the alarm bell is so important right now because we have the opportunity to kind of help, you know, make regulation mitigate those impacts before maybe it becomes too late.
Oh that's I'm so sweet. I just go throwing numbers.
You guys have great stats in the Airpart twenty thirty five, Golden Sacks projects the value of the satellite industry will reach one hundred and eight billion, up from fifteen billion. I'm being fun with you in terms of regulation because I'm just wondering. It sounds like Eric, somebody the government, like somebody needs to be watching and saying we got to deal with this potentially.
Yeah, and ironically, the government's decision that these things should sunset after five years was a part of looking at the situation and forward thinking. But you know, there's just no free lunch. So any policy decision is do they.
Have to have them sunset after five years.
Well, they'll stop working just at a certain point, and totally you don't want stuff flying around. I mean, one of the things they're looking at that engineers are looking at in terms of making these things themselves is are there other materials they can make it out of, you know, things that may not see the atmosphere with these particular chemicals.
SANA talk to us about the observed environmental impacts that we've seen so far. I know in the in the piece, you guys mentioned soot and I'm wondering, you know, scientists have observed these effects, but do we understand yet whether these are are necessarily bad or not.
Yeah, So it is an early It is an early field of research. But it has been seen that that like kerosene, which used to power many launches. So this is now talking about when the rockets are bringing the satellites into orbit that was powered by kerosene, which could lead to sub pollution. So that is you know, a chronicle chronicled effect.
And so when.
That is you know at at locked your heights like it's in the atmosphere, it absorbs heat and it accelerates glacial So that is one impact that we know is happening. But that's more associated with launches than with satellite re entries. With satellite re entries, it's a little bit more uncertain. They definitely have There's been a good amount of research that says that these particles have the especially the ones that are like aluminum and aluminum ones have the ability to you know.
Affect the ozone layer. But those are still.
Being studied and there's definitely like a lot more research that needs to be done to understand how is you know, the best way for satellite companies to think about this, the best way for governments to think about this industry.
Yeah, you know, it's interesting because you guys include in this too about what happened with jet fuel right and the impact on the ozone and certainly companies, the industries came together, and I want to put this out to both of you. Son, I'll go to you first, and then Eric maybe come on in. It's just I mean, is regulation even an option when you have someone like Elon Musk around the White House trying to get SpaceX contracts? You know, guilty, I've got you know, one of his discs.
I can't even think about. It's called Darling, Starling, Thank you very much.
Like I like, I understand it works really well the value, But I'm just curious, is it even an option with Elon Musk and Son? If you have some thoughts in that, then I'd love Eric for you to address as well.
Yeah, totally. I mean it's hard.
I feel like this is not you know, what's on top of mind for people in the government and especially satellite companies, and like the people that you think about this regulation, which is the FCC. The FCC makes the regulations for space companies. The Space Bureau chief of the FCC said that we can, you know, manage this without regulation, and we can be sustainable in space without regulation. But it's also like it's confusing how exactly that would happen without regulation.
And so I think that.
When you have an administry that is so enthusiastic about reaching the commercial heights of space and lower orbit, it's definitely feels more difficult than maybe it could have been in the past or in another administration. And also like we spoke to several companies and you know, they are going to keep operating the way they do unless someone tells them, you know, that there's new regulation you have to do that.
So I think it will really have to start at the top.
But as you said, I think it's a little bit difficult to see that really happening.
And today, Eric Coboning, could you guys even talk about I think someone talking about you know, we need some research a little bit more, right, and we know research has been cut back in a big way in the government.
Yeah, you can just roll out of bed and collect data from the top of the stratosphere. And there's some data that's that's come in over the years from launches to see what's what's in the wake of rocket launches. But this is they need a new program. There was there was a good study in twenty twenty three that came out, one of the first things to put this
on the map. They flew NASA stratospheric you know, high flying airplanes, collected some materials from up there, and they found that like already like ten percent of the stratospheric aerosols have aluminum in it from re entered satellites, you know.
The Yeah, so I don't know. I hate to leave people with like, well, there's there's a good part.
You know, we have a we have a strong history of dealing with the ozone layer. You know, there was a huge problem in the mid eighties. All the countries got together decided they were going to fix it, right.
Yeah, so like maybe we should take a page from the history books in this and Let's hope everybody looks at that and reminder of what we can do.
Guys. Incredible story Sna Passion Kerr.
She is a Bloomberg News Space reporter out in DC, and of course Eric Roston, Bloomberg New Sustainability Editor.
Check it out. It is the Bloomberg Big Take. It's on the Bloomberg