Chelsea, the last couple of weeks, I have been, I don't know,
overly happy, I guess they've been happy.
Like your joy. I was going to say, you've been uncomfortably optimistic.
Yeah. Well, don't worry.
The uncomfort level can go back to a normal level.
There always should be some uncomfort, but just like I don't.
I don't want people to not listen because of how uncomfortable they are
with the happiness factor.
I've been on edge with anticipation.
Good. Good.
We focused on garbage and recycling and whatnot and pollution.
And we know we've polluted the sea.
We know we've polluted the land.
We know we've polluted the air.
And we know we've even polluted the orbit of Earth with satellites.
But surely that space in between all that stuff I just described
hasn't been polluted, right?
Clean, very clean.
Well, we've kept that space clean.
Yeah, because we don't know what we would do there.
So why even put stuff there?
Well, this article comes from Live Science.
Live Science, I don't actually know which way to pronounce it.
That's the problem with English and just, you know, the exclusive written form.
Yeah. So this article is on Live Science.
It's by Harry Baker, written on where is the date on this?
All I know is it was written.
I can't confirm that.
Anyhow, article title.
Oh, sorry, October 24th, 2022.
There we go.
Article name falling metal space junk is changing Earth's upper atmosphere
in ways we don't fully understand.
A research plane that flew through Earth's stratosphere identified more than 20
elements that are linked to the aerospace industry.
Experts predict that the problem could become much worse in the future.
So let's go through this.
The sky is littered with metal pollution from bits of space junk.
The burn up is a reenter the atmosphere.
A new study reveals this unexpected level of contamination,
which will likely rise sharply in the coming decades,
could change our planet's atmosphere in ways we don't fully understand.
Researchers warn the study published on October 16th in the journal, PNAS.
That's the paper.
So it's PNAS. I laugh every time I see it, too.
It's the, I believe, paper for natural and astronomical sciences,
but they could have picked a better name.
PNAS.
You could have.
Is part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,
NOAA, Stratospheric Aerosol Processes, Budget and Radiative Effects,
which is Sabre Mission, which monitors the levels of aerosol,
tiny particles suspended in the air within the atmosphere.
Wow, that was a lot of long words to kind of,
I'm not really sure what they're going over there,
but it's about the paper.
We have the information.
Yeah.
The team used a research plane,
which was fitted with a specialized funnel on its nose
that captures and analyzes aerosol to sample the stratosphere.
The atmosphere's second layer that spans between 7.5 and 31 miles
above the planet's surface, or 12 and 50 kilometers.
The study was designed to detect aerosols covered with, quote,
meteor dust, and, quote, left behind by space rocks
that burned up upon entry.
Instead, the plane detected high levels of metallic elements
contaminating the floating molecules,
none of which could be explained by meteors
and other natural processes.
The two most surprising elements were neobium and hafnium,
which are both rare earth metals used to make technological components,
such as batteries.
The researchers were puzzled by the high levels of aluminum,
copper, and lithium.
The team had not expected to find these elements in the stratosphere
and were initially confused as to where they had come from.
Study lead author Daniel Murphy, an atmospheric chemist at NOAA's
Chemical Science Lab in Boulder, Colorado,
said in a statement that, quote,
but the combination of aluminum and copper plus neobium and hafnium,
which are used in heat-resistance high-performance alloys,
pointed us to the aerospace industry, end quote.
This discovery represents the first time that stratospheric pollution
has been unquestionably linked to reentry of space debris,
where the researchers noted.
And in total, the study identified 20 different metallic elements
that do not naturally occur in Earth's atmosphere,
including silver, iron, lead, magnesium, titanium,
beryllium, chromium, nickel, and zinc.
The team suspects that the main source of the pollution
is rocket boosters that are rejected by rockets shortly
after they clear the upper atmosphere
and then fall back down to Earth.
China, which was previously criticized
for a series of uncontrolled reentries,
is responsible for many of these rocket booster reentries.
However, this problem has also plagued Russia and NASA.
I really liked that they didn't name the U.S. out of all those.
Yeah, I find the building on all of that pretty funny.
Falling satellites that have been abandoned,
knocked out of orbit by solar storms or purposely,
crashed back to Earth,
are also likely to release large amount of metal pollution
as they burn up.
Pollution from satellites will likely increase
as more commercial satellites are launched into space.
Now, a particular concern is the nearly 9,000 satellites
that are currently in low Earth orbit,
which are destined to eventually fall back to Earth
according to Orbiting Now.
In total, around 10% of aerosols from the new study
were polluted with space metal junk.
But the researchers predict that this could jump
to around 50% in the next few decades.
It is currently too early to tell
what long-term effects this pollution will have on our planet,
but past atmospheric pollution,
such as chlorofluorocarbon CFCs,
contributed to holes in the ozone layer.
Aerosols also play a role in reflecting sunlight back into space,
which is important for mitigating the effects of climate change.
A lot of work will be needed
to understand the implications of these metals
in the atmosphere, Murphy said.
And that's where the article ends.
So, as of right now,
it's technically not a bad news,
because we don't know what kind of news.
I don't think, though,
this falls into the category of
can't choose or undecided, do you?
Undecided, yeah.
Can't choose between good or bad news.
I feel like I would file it into bad news.
I think it is bad news.
It just gets thrown into the mix
of all the other things that were ruining.
So, how are we even going to tell
that it's making things worse
than what we're already doing to the planet?
And I didn't like how
they threw that last little bit at the end.
Like, oh, by the way,
it might reflect stuff back.
So we're not warming as fast.
But I'm confident
to say what we're doing is probably bad.
Yeah, definitely bad.
And I feel like the wording on a lot of that stuff
is questionable.
Though, I can't agree with the message
if I understood it correctly.
I'm not sure if I did.
But what I get is we're not sure
that these things are bad,
but they probably are.
I've decided that for myself.
Yeah, and we are the deciders
at the end of the day.
Yeah, we definitely are.
And you can rest easy,
knowing that this decision
has been made for you
over these next 48 hours.
One thing off your plate.
And until Friday,
when we can make further decisions for you
in the longer form.
Yeah.
Anyhow, see you Friday.
Have a good day.