[Starlink] "They are retiring and incinerating about 4 or 5 Starlinks every day"

[Dave Taht]

I really hate phrasing like this.

"The demise of just one Gen1 Starlink satellite produces about
30 kilograms (66 pounds) of aluminum oxide, a compound that eats away
at the ozone layer. A new study finds these oxides have increased
8-fold between 2016 and 2022, and the recent surge is increasing the
pollution even more."

The atmosphere weighs 5.1 billion billion kilograms. In other words,
each satellite adds 1/203,333,333.333 more to the stratosphere.The
article would be more honest if it talked to the percentage increase
overall rather than the increase in detection.

This paper gives some pretty good estimates for the amount of this
stuff entering the atmosphere:

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2024GL109280#:~:text=Upon%20reaching%20an%20altitude%20of,reaching%20the%20stratospheric%20ozone%20layer.

But doesn´t project the effect on the ozone layer (in a quick skim)

...

The article does not include any reference to the  amount of global
warming added by aluminium oxide, but I originally imagined that it is
comparable to freon as to its effects to within an order of magnitude.

It is believed there are several million kilograms of Freon in the
atmosphere today.

But in researching this, it seems to believed here that alum oxide
actually might reduce global warming, but contributes to alzheimers!!?

https://www.bmj.com/content/377/bmj.o1150/rr-1

Now, since the quantities involved are so minute... coping... with
either conclusion... from this brief foray from the article, into the
science... is beyond my ken, and the study itself was definately worth
reading, and they should probably fly test flights more often.

https://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=06&month=02&year=2025

PS meteoroid flux averages at 32.2 metric tons/day.

On Wed, Feb 5, 2025 at 6:31 PM Kenneth Porter via Starlink
<starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>
> For the archives, persistent link to the 2025-02-06 blog entry:
>
> https://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=06&month=02&year=2025
>
>
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-- 
Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos