Radio pollution from SpaceX's new Starlink satellites poses threat to astronomy, scientists say
- by MSN
- Sep 19, 2024
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"With the first generation of satellites, [the radiation] was very sporadic. It wasn't quite as much of an issue," said Dempsey. "We were very surprised that this next generation is in some cases 1,000 times above what the limits that protect these frequencies around the antennas."
The LOFAR radio antennas are surrounded by radio quiet zones, which restrict the use of devices emitting low-frequency radio waves between 10 and 240 Mhz. The noise from above, however, is currently not subject to any regulations. With the growing number of Starlink satellites, this interference is quickly becoming ubiquitous. The Starllink constellation currently consists of more than 6,300 active satellites, but SpaceX has plans to launch over 40,000 of the spacecraft eventually. Other operations, including Amazon's Project Kuiper and the Chinese constellations Qianfan and Guowang, plan to deploy thousands of satellites in the coming years as well.
"Every time these satellites are launched, there's five years that they're up there," Dempsey said. "They [SpaceX] launch 40 satellites a week. So, it's so vitally important that we work together immediately to make sure that we have some conviction that these satellites are going to be quiet as soon as we can."
The interference will also affect the Square Kilometer Array Observatory (SKAO), the world's largest and most sensitive radio telescope, which is currently being constructed on sites in Australia and South Africa. The Australian part of the SKAO, focused on low frequency radio waves, like LOFAR, would especially suffer from the Starlink radio pollution, astronomers said. SKA-Low, which spreads across 19,100 square miles (49,500 square kilometers) of land in remote Western Australia, will have eight times the sensitivity of LOFAR. That means it will be eight times better at studying the ancient universe, but also eight times more vulnerable to unwanted radio noise. The $2.2 billion project is expected to come online at the end of this decade.
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