Salon (4 April 2025)

Erasing the stars: Satellite megaconstellations are a mega problem for Earth and sky

These satellites perform valuable services to humans on Earth and even, in some respects, to other living things — for example, by helping us monitor planet-heating emissions. In fact, recent research suggests they will be key to improving our data on CO2 emissions. Dr. John Barentine, an astronomer, dark sky consultant and historian of astronomy in Arizona, even pointed to the background image he uses for video calls as he spoke with Salon: it's a global composite image of Earth made by remote sensing platforms in space. "Without them," he said, "we would not have anything approaching the understanding of the problem that we do have."

Read more: https://www.salon.com/2025/04/04/erasing-the-stars-satellite-megaconstellations-are-a-mega-problem-for-earth-and-sky/