alt Hacker NewsFCC approves test of space mirror to light night sky
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They seem to be talking about each satellite managing the luminosity of the full moon over a few square kilometres, and getting a few tens of thousands of them.
Even if you ignoring how much drag these must have, and hence how much electrical power you'd need for an ion drive just to keep them up, each spot being a few km across (and only getting light while the satellite is over your horizon) is just not compelling.
Given most people don't have any reason to illuminate several square kilometres at once, for realistic scenarios it will take a lot of satellites before you beat the cheap battery-powered floodlights in my local Aldi or Kaufland, and the batteries in those lasts a lot longer than the 10-15 or so minutes each of the satellites will be over the horizon, and reflectors like these can only supply sunlight close to sunset otherwise the earth blocks the sun from them.
In the list of things which, if you could make them at all useful, would also be relatively easy to redesign as weapons.
> There are many problems with this proposal, including impacts these satellites will have on human health and safety, as well as on astronomy and the low-Earth environment.
> Flashes during mirror repointing could disrupt pilots and drivers. The light could also disrupt circadian rhythms of plants, animals and humans
Wonder what would happen if a hacker focused all ten thousand of them on a single area for an hour or two. Sounds like a really energy-efficient way to demolish a city.
X Wing: Wedge’s Gamble (1996) by Michael Stackpole shows the rebel alliance using similar tricks during the battle of Coruscant.
How are the economics of this idea meant to be viable? The proposed business model is to park hundreds of millions to billion dollars of satellites in orbit, plus the costs to maintain and operate them, to meet the goal of selective area illumination and solar power. Ignoring the issue of cloud cover, which still seems to be an impediment. That's going to need to directly compete with terrestrial energy storage technology, e.g. batteries, and... general lighting. Both of which are well established, diversified and reliable market segments with vastly cheaper MWh costs compared to beaming a small amount of light down using a satellite.
This strikes me as another hand-waved scifi/fantasy inspired investment, where everyone is so caught up in proving they can achieve this (spoiler: this is obviously possible) that no one has stopped to ask does that achievement lead to a real benefit outside of VC wealth transference?
So we've got this problem of the atmosphere trapping too much heat from solar radiation hitting the surface and the plan is to increase the amount of solar radiation hitting the surface?
Finally, we can replace daylight saving time by just making more daylight instead
The only non-marginal application for this is military, surely.
It sounds too coarse-grade in terms of its area to be anything other than disruptive socially and ecologically.
Sporting and cultural events? Not really (extending the hours of sunlight over a city does have marginal value for a major celebratory event I suppose, but there just aren't that many of these).
Farming? Don't plants need night too? Does harvesting need the sun anymore?
But being able to illuminate a war zone with spontaneous sunlight you can switch off at will, that is a weapon, not least because if you are the only one with the power, your opponents will have to act knowing they may not have the cover of night.
It's not as dangerous as allowing Elon Musk to launch so many more satellites that he ends up with de facto control over access to earth orbit, but it's pretty dangerous.
i give you: the industrial revolution and its consequences
The fact that they're spelling this Earendil, not Earendel, makes me think this is a direct reference to Tolkien's work. It's pretty weird for dystopian industrial initiatives to be named after characters in a work whose most unambiguous message was that rampant industrialization was ruining the world.
We've entered the "bond villain" era of VC startups
somebody watched die another day (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_Another_Day) and thought, “hmm. great idea.”
This is genuinely the stuff of nightmares. Imagine not even being able to have night time any more.
“The regular early morning yell of horror was the sound of Arthur Dent waking up and suddenly remembering where he was" - Douglas Adams
Ahem. Ladies and Gentlemen. I have placed in orbit a giant mirror that will reflect 40% of the Sun's rays. Thus cooling Earth. Observe.
at some point some rogue country is going to do a starfish-prime event
create an artificial LEO radiation belt on purpose and wipe out 99% of satellites
part of me is oddly rooting for it these days
make Musk a millionaire again
> Eärendil-1
Can everyone just stop with all the LOTR references already why the fuck is this such a thing.
this is the sort of startup we get when memes rule the investing landscape.
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Chinese outcry? There’s a lot of that in social media, their bot warriors are everywhere. Same with AI and anything that gives the USA competitive edge.
Earth orbits, low orbits above all, are a finite resource, and suffer pollution as every environment, with all this kind of satellites growing in number to millions, things can go badly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome
Apart tecnical and scientific reasons (no need to use thousand or million of sats), apart big speculations (suspect is the main reason), many problems can be resolved in others ways.
One question I have is about apparent magnitude: given the satellite's small size (relative to the apparent size of the moon) it would have to be very bright to match the luminosity of the full moon on the surface.
In this article: https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/new-kind-of-satel...
> calculated that the Reflect Orbital spacecraft would appear as points of light with a magnitude of -15 [...] might damage the eye.
-15 seems ~10 times brighter than the moon (-12,6) if I got the formula right so it would indeed be very bright.
Reminds me of all the led lighting we have now: one evening on a random street I watched the cars, bicycles, shops, street lamps: all leds, yes a bit brighter and colder than the old bulbs I know, buuut the light sources being very small dots (with no diffuser), it feels very harsh to the eye, at least to me.
Anyway, even if it proves useful for something, it would join the long list of innovations doing one thing at the expense of everyone else (externality == light pollution in this case).