The starry night sky has always anchored humanity’s sense of place in a vast universe. It’s a map guiding travelers, a calendar for migrations and harvests, a wellspring of stories. But a surge of commercial satellite launches into the upper fringes of Earth’s atmosphere threatens the relationship between people and the celestial commons by crowding the night sky and polluting the atmosphere, scientists warn.
Research shows potential impacts on Earth’s climate , including a 2025 paper led by a NASA scientist that found accumulations of metal particles from satellites disintegrating in the upper atmosphere can alter temperatures and wind flows, with ripple effects on surface climate patterns.
More than 15,000 active and inactive satellites orbit Earth, up from under 1,000 at the start of the century, and scientists estimate that hundreds of them are overhead at any given hour over North America and Europe. Now several companies want to launch huge fleets of satellites over the next 10 to 20 years, pending regulatory approval and financing.
Four companies are pursuing Federal Communications Commission licensing: Reflect Orbital wants to launch mirrored satellites to sell strips of sunlight on Earth. Blue Origin, Starcloud and SpaceX propose deploying hundreds of thousands of data-processing satellites, pushing the AI race into near-Earth orbit. All that, plus the ongoing space tourism industry, with some rides to space costing millions of dollars, and this week’s first public sale of SpaceX stock, shows that commercial space activity is part of a tech investment bubble subject to markets and quarterly earnings expectations.
The proposed satellite fleets would require thousands of launches and re-entries per year, each leaving a trail of soot, greenhouse gases and other industrial pollutants that can deplete ozone and change atmospheric chemistry with uncertain consequences for Earth’s climate and ecosystems.
Because the FCC oversees the radio frequencies and communications licenses used by satellite networks, it is the first regulatory hurdle for U.S. companies developing orbital projects.
Researchers and space governance experts say current agreements like the Outer Space Treaty don’t adequately address stewardship, equity and collective responsibility, required ingredients for a framework that can effectively manage space for the common good.
“We are teetering on the precipice of how the uses of space are changing, and that threatens our ability to use space,” said astronomer and dark sky policy expert John Barentine , who co-founded the Center for Space Environmentalism in 2025.
The center filed formal comments with the FCC on all four satellite-fleet proposals, writing that the deployments are “a massive industrialization of orbit that poses severe collision risks” and that they push the massive energy demands of artificial intelligence into low Earth orbit, threatening its sustainability. And mirroring sunlight to Earth from satellites could threaten ecosystems and disrupt astronomical research, the group added.
A spokesperson for Reflect Orbital, the company that wants to test the idea of space mirrors, said the technology could help provide clean, on-demand energy without increasing fossil fuel use. The company plans a phased testing approach, including environmental studies and consultations with scientists, astronomers, regulators and local communities, and said it would modify or halt deployments if there is evidence of harmful environmental impacts.
SpaceX, Blue Origin and Starcloud didn’t answer questions about environmental impacts and governance. Instead, the companies referred to FCC filings and to public statements outlining their plans. Without pointing to supporting scientific evidence, they claim that new satellite constellations could provide more broadband access and more computing power for AI systems while reducing environmental impacts on Earth.
Public Benefit or Private Control?
The Center for Space Environmentalism argues that the FCC should require full environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act because satellite megaconstellations and other space projects can affect the atmosphere, the night sky, ecosystems and communities, yet are currently approved without a comprehensive analysis of those impacts.
Barentine said his studies of environmental history show that human relationships with the natural world, including starscapes, are powerful forces that have shaped cultural evolution for millennia, making the last 150 years of technological progress the exception, not the norm.
Barentine said people have assumed space is so vast that human actions couldn’t meaningfully change it. That’s remarkably similar to how people once thought about Earth’s atmosphere and oceans before countries adopted science-based international rules.
Right now, he said, international rules and diplomatic efforts to govern off-Earth activities are not slowing the space…
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