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Tuesday, April 28, 2026
Free Deep Dive Webinar on Space Commerce With Emphasis on Orbiting Data Centers
Thursday, February 5, 2026
SpaceX Proposes a Million More Satellites on Paper
SpaceX has filed a groundbreaking proposal to launch and operate one million small satellites as a data center in space. See https://fccprod.servicenowservices.com/icfs?id=ibfs_application_summary&number=SAT-LOA-20260108-00016.
My two immediate
reactions: Wow! and Is There Less Than Meets the Eye?
First the
Wow! In the spirit of moving fast and subverting
conventional wisdom, SpaceX and Elon Musk have turned the AI and Data Center
topography upside down. Launch a massive
constellation of small satellites in Low Earth Orbit and the gravitational pulls
from water, electric power, and real estate issues, as well as many unresolved regulatory,
international law, and U.S. treaty commitments evaporate. Poof!
Is this a
great country or what?
With this
filing, Space X proposes to increase the number of orbiting spacecraft from
about 12,000 to 1,112,000 (European Space Agency non space data center forecast
of 100,000 satellites by 2030 (see https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Sets/Space_Debris_Is_it_a_Crisis).
LEO orbiting satellites will not deplete any scarce
terrestrial resources. Surely Artificial Intelligence applications will get a boost
as will U.S. competition to maintain global technological, military, and commercial
space supremacy. At least conceptually,
we consumers of data center and broadband service should benefit from faster,
better, smarter, cheaper, and sustainable cheaper goods and services.
What’s not to
like?
A lot, which
leads me to: Is There Less Than Meets the Eye?
While admiring
the quest to capture first mover market advantages and public imagination, I
hereby throw cold water, aluminum particles and gas from vaporizing space junk,
and other inconvenient, but not easily ignored issues, making the project far
less than it appears from recent headlines and social network posts.
First, consider the number of exceptions SpaceX wants the FCC to issue. For a summary of the waiver requests, see https://www.fcc.gov/document/sb-accepts-filing-spacexs-application-orbital-data-centers. In simple English, SpaceX wants the FCC to treat the application exclusively and not in the customary filing window where other similar applications would get considered at the same time.
SpaceX also wants exemption from all
milestone requirements and deployment obligations meaning that it has no
deadlines and benchmarks to satisfy as proof of ongoing progress toward
complete deployment of satellites and the start of service. Contrast that
request with Elon Musk’s forecast that the data center in space will reach a
critical mass in 30-36 months from now with more AI space launches than
terrestrial expansion within 5 years. See https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-getting-serious-orbital-185049655.html.
Despite its
considerable access to internal and external funding befitting a venture with
an estimated value of $1 trillion, SpaceX seeks the waiver of all surety bond
requirements and obligations. Lastly, SpaceX wants to work on its ambitious
project without disclosing technical details such as channel plans for licensed
beams, uplink and downlink beams, command beams, and orbital plane
configurations.
If the FCC
were to grant such an extensive waiver wish list, SpaceX would have quite
limited obligations to disclose how its space data center would operate and
whether other competing satellite constellations could share that part of LEO having
the right combination of solar power potential and heat discharge.
There is a
growing list of chronic and emerging issues that call into question whether
space, as enormous as it is, can accommodate 1 million more LEO satellites in
relatively close proximity to each other. Space tourism, asteroid mining for
scare minerals, and the colonization of the Moon and Mars, also will require
shared access. A massive increase in
spacecraft, coupled with an expectation that earth hostilities will have a space
surveillance, military, and warfare component substantially raise the odds for
collisions, as well as an increase in toxicity from spacecraft launches and vaporization
when falling back to earth.
The SpaceX
grand proposal reminds me of the absolute necessity of having both full
disclosure of technical, operational, radio spectrum, and orbital plane usage,
coupled with a realistic timeline for starting service. Without these requirements, and “skin the
game” financial commitments, subject to forfeiture, SpaceX can, worse case,
propose nothing more than a paper satellite constellation that could chill
investment in competing, perhaps less ambitious but more timely and practical
projects.
It makes sense
to consider the six pages of conditions imposed by the FCC for StarLink’s
second generation broadband network. See https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-36A1.pdf.
If the FCC
wants to remain true to its “Open Skies,” procompetitive ethos, it has to offer
flexibility in its processing of innovative service applications, but also
guard against ambitious paper satellite proposals designed to preempt
competition and corner a market years before the first of one million
satellites reaches orbit.
Thursday, March 6, 2025
What If Moving Fast Results in Unrepairable, Broken Things Like Inner Space and Earth’s Upper Atmosphere?
Until 2014, Facebook’s official mantra was “move fast and break things” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Move_fast_and_break_things. Mark Zuckerberg coined the phrase https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/move-fast-break-things-facebook-motto/; to emphasize the need for speedy, first mover advantages, even if such initiatives result in harmful outcomes. Apparently, his undoubtably biased cost/benefit analysis generated a net positive outcome, presumably for Facebook and everyone else.
Maybe not.
See, e.g., https://hbr.org/2019/01/the-era-of-move-fast-and-break-things-is-over;
https://leaddev.com/velocity/why-you-shouldnt-move-fast-and-break-things.
The lack of
guard rails, of any sort, invariably results in knowable and unknowable
calamities, that individually and collectively change the value proposition,
particularly for non-investors.
Just now, scientists are determining, without doubt, that low earth orbiting satellite constellations, like Starlink, have a real, quantifiable, and harmful impact on space and earth atmosphere. See: https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-reentry-pollution-damage-earth-atmosphere;
https://www.science.org/content/article/burned-satellites-are-polluting-atmosphere;
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/satellite-space-junk-havoc-stratosphere.
Low earth
orbiting satellites, like those operated by Starlink, are smaller and lighter
than prior generations of telecommunications space craft. However, operators must launch thousands of them
to achieve global coverage. Their close
proximity to earth and constant motion, relative to earth, require frequent
launches to replace failing and end of life units.
The
toxification of space and earth atmosphere occurs when launching satellites and
when they fall out of orbit on a downward trajectory toward earth, typically
after only five years of service.
Satellite launches release massive amounts of fumes, such as sulfuric
acid, into earth’s atmosphere. Individual
satellite vaporization releases a far smaller volume of metallic vapors,
particles, and aerosols, but the numbers add up in light of the number of spacecraft
replacing or augmenting the constellation, as well as units no longer in
service. Each first generation Starlink
satellite releases approximately 30 kilograms of material in its descent. Second generation satellites are larger and
accordingly will release a larger amount of particles.
The composition
of vaporizing satellites and other spacecraft includes aluminum oxide and trace
minerals that are classified as pollutants:
Letting these satellites burn up in the atmosphere at the end of their lives helps keep the quantity of space junk to a minimum. But doing so deposits satellite ash in the middle layers of Earth’s atmosphere. This metallic ash can harm the atmosphere and potentially alter the climate. https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/12/09/1108076/satellite-reentry-atmospheric-pollution/. See https://research.noaa.gov/noaa-scientists-link-exotic-metal-particles-in-the-upper-atmosphere-to-rockets-satellites/; https://research.noaa.gov/projected-increase-in-space-travel-may-damage-ozone-layer/
It should come as no surprise that Starlink, and their sponsored researchers and opinion leaders, seek limited, if any, governmental oversight and regulation of space activities. The Heritage Foundation, Project 2025 Chapter on the FCC, written by the newly appointed Chairman, Brendan Carr, https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf Chapter 28, 845-859, recommends a most friendly regulatory environment, including expedited processing of satellite launch applications. The Heritage Foundation previously advocated for the elimination of environmental impact assessment of space activities. See https://www.heritage.org/government-regulation/report/keep-environmental-red-tape-out-outer-space.
Elon Musk,
has singularly advantageous opportunity to influence governmental space policy in
ways that favor his ventures. In a prior blog entry, I predicted that SpaceX
soon will qualify for broadband universal service subsidies worth billions. See https://telefrieden.blogspot.com/2025/02/add-millions-more-to-musk-account.html.
Today, I
predict that at some future date, measurable, costly toxification of space and
earth atmosphere will be caused by known stakeholders who succeeded in
foreclosing research, harm assessment, and conservation. They probably will not
even incur the cost in the determination whether and how remediation is
possible.
Thank Elon
Musk for his service to our nation.
