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DreamOfTheEndlessSky t1_j9slomg wrote

Reply to comment by bigsoftee84 in What will be the environmental impact of de-orbiting 42,000 Starlink satellites every five years? (Explanation in post) by OvidPerl

Coal plants burn what you throw in them, and coal isn't pure. That's how you get things like radioactive coal ash.

The questions to ask next would be along the lines of:

  • what metallic contents are found in typical fuel coal?
  • how much of that gets into fly ash?
  • how different are near-surface metallic emissions and stratospheric metallic emissions?

But I don't have data for those.

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bigsoftee84 t1_j9smj01 wrote

Ok, but again, that issue doesn't negate the possible environmental impacts of burning off tons of metal in the atmosphere by a different industry. Does SpaceX get a pass because coal companies are bad? We should be limiting this type of waste and pollution, not trying to wave it away because a different industry is worse.

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DreamOfTheEndlessSky t1_j9sn69m wrote

That's not how I read the above comment at all.

I saw it saying something more like "if the satellites create a problem, you could offset that by a small reduction in an existing terrible industry". But, as I pointed out, I don't have sufficient information to connect them as substitutable effects.

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bigsoftee84 t1_j9sny23 wrote

Do you remember carbon credits? Incentives to try to encourage carbon reduction? When you offset pollution with another form of pollution, you haven't reduced pollution, just moved the source. We shouldn't ignore one source of pollution for another because we support one industry over the other. We should be reducing all pollution as much as possible, not adding new sources and types of pollution.

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DreamOfTheEndlessSky t1_j9ssz87 wrote

That would be a terrible rule. If you can't "add new sources and types of pollution", as you say, you've just eliminated perfectly reasonable ways to significantly reduce the sum: you couldn't use wind power, because it adds a "new source and type of pollution" in the form of broken turbine blades. Your rule, as stated, wouldn't let us consider the drastic improvement it makes in the form of reduced coal/natgas combustion. You would effectively mandate BAU.

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veerKg_CSS_Geologist t1_j9t2udy wrote

Wind power is net negative in pollution. It’s not replacing one source with another equal source aka carbon credits.

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DreamOfTheEndlessSky t1_j9t3qs1 wrote

Their rule doesn't allow "net negative". They went with "no new positive, no matter how much it helps elsewhere". Any new type of pollution would be prohibited, so the (agreed) significant improvement of switching coal to wind power generation would be disallowed ... showing that it's a bad rule to choose.

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bigsoftee84 t1_j9sx4kw wrote

You're missing the point. Yes, those materials may be naturally occurring in the earth's crust, but so is carbon. We don't know the effects of this, and it should be studied way before we just allow them to dump tons of new pollution into the atmosphere. The current method is also exceptionally wasteful, I don't understand the waving away of people's concerns. These issues need to be addressed now, not when they become disasters.

When that satellite burns up, those resources are just wasted. We need a real plan to deal with space junk. Burning our waste is part of what put us in this mess. It needs to stop being the default solution. Is the internet so vital that we should continue the practices that put us in the environmental mess we find ourselves in currently?

Fossil fuel consumption is absolutely an issue that needs to be addressed, I am saying we need to be watchful of new waste and wasteful practices. I don't want my grandchildren asking me why we let them poison the sky.

I wish I knew how to properly express my concerns. I live in a state whose fish are poisoned with mercury from the logging industry. There are areas where landfills poisoned the ground. Whole towns smell like rotten eggs because the mills have poisoned the air and water. Everyone let it happen because other issues seemed more pressing. Now the mills are dead or dying, the landfills are leaking, and those responsible are long gone or already rich enough to not care. We are losing trees to invasive species and diseases because folks and companies have more pressing issues.

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veerKg_CSS_Geologist t1_j9t2rv1 wrote

Why not both?

Otherwise all you’ve done is stand still (say the pollution reduced by shutting down a single coal plant is negated by the pollution from all the satellites).

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