Scientists and environmental advocates are pushing back against a billionaire-supported push to put data centers in orbit, saying the plan would leave the downsides of giant server farms unresolved on Earth while potentially adding a separate pollution threat in space and in Earth's atmosphere.
What's happening?
According to Futurism, citing a Guardian report, Earthjustice has submitted a 29-page filing asking the Federal Communications Commission to take a hard look at orbital data center proposals.
The group has said that moving ahead without a full environmental review could run afoul of federal law.
As a formal "petition to deny," the filing relies on verified facts. It said the FCC is now reviewing multiple proposals to send "extraordinary numbers of satellite-based data centers" into low Earth orbit over the next decade.
The document contains 113 footnotes and lays out what may be one of the most extensive public warnings so far about the concept's environmental cost.
"The operation of more than a million data center satellites threatens potentially catastrophic forms and quantities of atmospheric pollution, risking damage to the climate, to the ozone layer, to human health, and to the chemistry of the stratosphere itself," the petition said.
TCD Picks » Quince Spotlight
💡These best-sellers from Quince deliver affordable, sustainable luxury for all
Why does it matter?
The concept has attracted interest from billionaires including Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, and Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and Blue Origin. Backers have argued that when local communities resist large, power-hungry data centers on the ground, companies could avoid those disputes by shifting that computing capacity into space.
Opponents have said that approach does not eliminate the damage; it just relocates it to a realm that is harder for the public to see and contest. In the petition's view, more launches, collisions, and reentries would add to pollution already accumulating in the upper atmosphere.
Any negative impacts on the ozone layer or climate would also have consequences on Earth, including increased health dangers, greater environmental disruption, and economic burdens that would ultimately fall on the public.
The filing also noted that the stratosphere is already seeing a sharp buildup of heavy metals, noxious gases, and carbon particles tied to record satellite launches.
TCD Picks » Quince Spotlight
💡These best-sellers from Quince deliver affordable, sustainable luxury for all
What's being done?
Earthjustice wants the FCC to require an environmental assessment before approving licenses for orbital data centers, Futurism reported.
"The proponents of these proposals describe their plans in grandiose, civilization-changing terms," the petition reads. "But these same proponents have refused to embrace any inquiry into the impacts of their self-claimed epochal technology on the environment, science, economy, or other values."
The petition's authors said they are "concerned that no [company] has yet provided more than a token acknowledgment of environmental risks" and that "no [company] has provided satisfactory detail to explain how it will mitigate the cumulative environmental harms flowing from the foreseeable operation of more than a million satellites [emphasis in original], orbiting our planet, colliding and disintegrating and plummeting back to Earth."
Get TCD's free newsletters for easy tips, smart advice, and a chance to earn $5,000 toward home upgrades. To see more stories like this one, change your Google preferences here.
