{"id":1117,"date":"2026-07-17T15:21:42","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T15:21:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/07\/17\/why-ais-environmental-footprint-wont-disappear-into-orbit\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T15:21:42","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T15:21:42","slug":"why-ais-environmental-footprint-wont-disappear-into-orbit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/07\/17\/why-ais-environmental-footprint-wont-disappear-into-orbit\/","title":{"rendered":"Why AI\u2019s environmental footprint won\u2019t disappear into orbit"},"content":{"rendered":"

AI companies increasingly want to move their operations into space<\/a>. Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX has applied to launch over a million AI data centre satellites<\/a> and ultimately build them on the moon<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jeff Bezos<\/a>, Google<\/a>, OpenAI<\/a> and others<\/a> have similar plans. The idea is to harness 24\/7 solar energy and, in Bezos\u2019s vision at least, to move all polluting industries off-world<\/a>, re-zoning Earth for humans and nature. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s an intriguing plan. But once you factor in the whole life cycle, from water and rocket fuel used to launch these satellites into space, to keeping them cool and eventually disposing of old satellites, the environmental case becomes less clear.<\/p>\n

Outer space, out of mind<\/h2>\n

Off-worlding polluting industries is not a new idea. In the 1970s, when the last Iranian oil crisis caused rocketing fuel prices, Nasa kicked off a plan<\/a> to build huge solar plants in space. The idea flopped<\/a> when the oil began to flow again. <\/p>\n

Nasa also explored the prospect of storing nuclear materials<\/a> on the moon and blasting hazardous waste at the sun. These plans may have been feasible from an engineering perspective but were politically impossible due to the risk of radioactive particles eventually falling back to earth<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n \"black<\/a>
\n A concept image from Nasa\u2019s 1978 proposal for a 10km-wide \u2018satellite power system\u2019. The space-based solar farm is visible top right, while the energy would be beamed down to a \u2018rectenna farm\u2019 on earth, in the centre of the image.<\/span>
\n Nasa \/ US DoE \/ Satellite Power System (SPS) Concept Development and Evaluation Program Plan, 1978.<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Since data centres need so much energy, much of it for AI, such astronomical ideas are back on the table<\/a>. Regular Earth-based data centres were responsible for around 5%<\/a> of all electricity used in the US last year, for instance, mostly using fossil fuels<\/a>. Their share of US power demand will likely triple<\/a> by 2028. <\/p>\n

The fragile frontier<\/h2>\n

That\u2019s why the cold vacuum of space, with its endless supply of solar energy, is being pitched<\/a> as a more sustainable alternative to big, noisy, hot data centres<\/a> in our back yards. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, a recent petition<\/a> from environmental law charity Earthjustice, is calling for a comprehensive review. They argue these proposals fail to acknowledge any environmental impact. \u201cThis is not just poor planning and a missed opportunity\u201d, the petition states<\/a>, \u201cit violates federal law\u201d.<\/p>\n

Indeed, SpaceX\u2019s planning applications come with assurances of no meaningful environmental impact<\/a>. \u201cIt\u2019s always sunny in space,\u201d according to Musk<\/a>, who says orbital data centres are \u201cobviously the only way to scale\u201d. <\/p>\n

Yet data centres in space would be even more prone to overheating than those on earth. That\u2019s because, like a Thermos flask, space keeps things hot. There\u2019s no water or air to carry excess heat away. Instead, keeping powerful AI chips cool in orbit requires massive ammonia-filled radiators that let heat escape as infrared radiation. This isn\u2019t very efficient and those radiators are much larger than the computers they cool. Lifting these huge structures to orbit would require a lot of rocket fuel. <\/p>\n

Most plans for orbital data centres<\/a> depend on the future success of SpaceX\u2019s heavy-lift Starship. But every Starship launch burns over 1,000 tonnes of liquid methane<\/a>, releasing around 80,000 tonnes of CO\u2082 (about the same as what 20,000 cars emit in a year). The warming associated with soot emissions in the upper atmosphere is 500 times more intense<\/a> than the same emissions at ground level. We know<\/a> soot from rockets reduces stratospheric ozone \u2013 the stuff shielding us from harmful UV rays. In the lower atmosphere, most soot falls back to Earth in weeks. In the stratosphere, soot stays there for up to four years, prolonging its damaging effects.<\/p>\n

While it is always sunny in space, solar panels degrade much quicker there. Microchips are also easily damaged, falling prey to a phenomenon known as \u201cbit flipping\u201d \u2013 when high-energy particles rewrite memory hardware randomly changing data from 1 to 0. Retrieving busted hardware from space is not financially viable. SpaceX satellites have a five-year shelf life before being incinerated as they fall back to Earth. The environmental impacts<\/a> of things burning up in the atmosphere are not well known.<\/p>\n

Musk\u2019s AI satellites would be connected by lasers<\/a>. Should any one of the million or so satellites become untethered and collide with another, it would create further debris, creating more risk of collisions, more debris, and so on. Scientists call this the Kesler Syndrome<\/a> and worry that orbital debris fields could hinder human activities in space for a very long time.<\/p>\n

Orbital data centres would have a huge water footprint too. To catch toxic dust and protect their concrete launch pad from heat damage, a typical spaceport uses a deluge system<\/a> releasing around 2 million litres of water with every launch. SpaceX has repeatedly broken<\/a> environmental laws with its deluge system, allowing contaminated run-off from Starship launches to enter protected waters off the coast of Texas.<\/p>\n

Some suggest these sci-fi schemes are designed to prop up SpaceX\u2019s teetering stock price<\/a>, rather than humanity\u2019s computing needs. Others see orbital data centres as just one of many ambitious visions<\/a> to tackle the environmental costs of AI. Either way, my research suggests<\/a> this quest to off-world the industry\u2019s headaches will have profound implications that are not well understood.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Peter Howson has received research funding from the British Academy. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AI companies increasingly want to move their operations into space. Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX has applied to launch over a million AI data centre satellites and ultimately build them on the moon. Jeff Bezos, Google, OpenAI and others have similar plans. The idea is to harness 24\/7 solar energy and, in Bezos\u2019s vision at least, to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1117\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}