They really needed to include a paragraph about the expected effects of Starship. It may not be ready yet, but that’s in our near future, with a lot more launches.

If one of their concerns was soot from burning kerosene like SpaceX Falcon, what difference does methane make? They mentioned Blue Origin, it if that is hydrogen, what difference does that make compared to methane?

It would also have been useful to clearly distinguish affects from launches vs satellites, since that may direct possible strategies

[–] melfie@lemmy.zip 5 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

Elon says they will eventually make methane from carbon captured from the air and be carbon neutral, but I’ll believe it when I see it. They currently bring in 200 tankers per launch to make propellant, including LNG. Sounds like they are building facilities to extract oxygen and nitrogen from the air, but I’m guessing they’ll still need 30-50 trucks of LNG per launch.

https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/09/spacex-moves-closer-to-making-its-own-rocket-fuel-at-starship-launch-site/

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 4 points 6 days ago

I suppose it depends on cost, and how many launches they actually do. Trucking in LNG can’t be very efficient or scalable.