
FCC’s Approval of SpaceX’s Starlink Mega Constellation May Have Been Unlawful - sohkamyung
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-fccs-approval-of-spacexs-starlink-mega-constellation-may-have-been-unlawful/
======
tssva
The article references language in section 1508 of NEPA to as a possibility of
why the FCC might have needed to perform an environmental review; however, if
you read the quoted language in context of the full section it seems to
require a tortured reading of the section to apply it in this case.

~~~
jerf
"“Astronomers are having these issues [and think] there’s nothing they can do
legally,” says the paper’s author Ramon Ryan, a _second-year law student_ at
Vanderbilt University."

Emphasis mine. And that's their lead-off quote. The sense I get from the other
quotes in the article is that the people in question probably really did say
that, but that they probably don't believe this is a viable legal avenue
either, the journalist is just selectively quoting the "But I suppose with the
right combination of unlikely events it could be a possible legal avenue"
hedging they made. But I admit that's a personal impression of mine, not
something I can prove. I'm just inferring it based on the tepidness of the
other quotes.

However, I don't blame a student for putting out a paper. I blame the
Scientific American for constructing such a thinly-based article, because the
real reason is that they want the controversy stirred up, or it's what they
personally wanted to say even though the factual basis isn't really there to
support it. This sort of crap is why journalists aren't trusted. Story-first,
evidence later; it's like they're the equal and opposite reaction to
scientists existing in the world.

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hurricanetc
I just really don’t care at all. People abuse the hell out of the NEPA just to
shut down or slow down things they don’t like. Rarely is it ever actually
about the environment.

~~~
qwerty456127
And I'm curious how much of cable ISPs and totalitarian governments lobby is
behind the anti-Starlink hype.

~~~
hurricanetc
Musk also seems to spawn hordes of naysayers and pessimists who would rather
revel in his personal failure than see a better world brought partially by his
successes.

I am not sure exactly why people react this way. Are people also following
around Bill Gates vocally hoping his ventures into vaccination and energy go
belly up?

~~~
lioeters
I think part of the reason why Musk and his ventures attract vocal opponents
is that he's challenging entrenched interests and making good progress at it.

To speculate, there might be financial movitations for negative PR campaigns,
for example from the oil and traditional automobile industries.

~~~
93po
Oil companies, energy companies, automobile companies and their endless
suppliers, banks hate him because of PayPal, defense contractors might hate
him if SpaceX takes over some contracts they'd otherwise have. Other battery
manufacturers. The several other self driving companies (or divisions I guess
since they seem to all get acquired). I don't know, the list is probably
endless.

Edit: light rail companies and their supporting infrastructure companies

------
u02sgb
Finding a way to avoid red tape seems like a massive cost and time saving.

I remember seeing something similar with The Boring Company. Avoiding red tape
by getting the city to agree the depth was great enough to not need look into
environmental impact.

~~~
wahern
What's costly in California isn't the EIR, but the subsequent lawsuits. Boring
Company got an exemption in Hawthorne because they were tunneling under a
relatively poor neighborhood and nobody showed up at the public hearings to
challenge the exemption. Poor people have neither the expertise, resources,
nor inclination to game the system, at least not unless there's a local
community activist.

But rich people do, and that's what happened with the Dodger Stadium project:
NIMBYs arrived and the city immediately caved. So now Boring Company is doing
the EIR. But, again, EIRs are easy. It's exceptional that something major is
found, like an endangered species; usually it's simple, basic stuff; the kind
of stuff originally intended to be remediated with the reports. There's a
whole industry of professionals that come out, run tests, and write it up with
little friction. But under California's CEQA, NIMBYs can challenge it
endlessly in the courts without repercussions. It's a complete absurdity and
has nothing to do with environmental impacts. But the law can't be changed
because the rich and powerful know full well that its function is to permit
neighborhoods and special interests to block projects, and they won't give
that up.

Boring Company will never get an exemption where an exemption would truly
matter.

~~~
tachyonbeam
> Boring Company will never get an exemption where an exemption would truly
> matter.

If California wants to prevent growth and keep repeatedly shooting itself in
the foot for decades to come, it's a choice. It makes that market less
competitive. People seem to imagine that silicon valley will remain the
dominant tech hub of the world forever, but that could change. Maybe,
eventually, it's California that won't matter anymore.

~~~
ptyyy
> Maybe, eventually, it's California that won't matter anymore.

California's economy is the fifth-largest in the world. It's a whole lot more
than a tech hub.

------
eganist
Not to ask the dumb question, but what's the tangible environmental impact of
having satellites visible at certain during the night in an unpolluted sky
that in-theory burn up when they're decommissioned much like any meteor might?

I don't mean the impact to human projects e.g. astronomy or even to human
culture. I mean to the actual environment itself and the life surrounding us,
since the argument seems to make the claim that there's a detrimental
environmental impact.

> In its reasoning for its categorical exclusion, the FCC states that its
> actions “have no significant effect on the quality of the human environment
> and are categorically excluded from environmental processing.” Ryan says
> that the FCC may have been wrong in this assessment, however. “The FCC has
> never performed a study showing why commercial satellites deserved to be
> classified as categorically excluded from review,” he says. “And the
> evidence shows that these satellites are having an environmental impact. If
> the FCC were sued over its noncompliance with NEPA, it would likely lose.”

For instance, the obvious environmental impact of this case cited in the
article:

> National Institutes of Health [was] defeated by environmental groups on the
> question of the lawfulness of the agency’s approval of genetically modified
> bacteria for crops without proper review

because of the unknown risks of engineered genes leaking into the gene pools
of their respective organisms and potentially drastically impacting life.

> U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lost a case in which it had approved licenses
> for gambling barges in Mississippi without proper NEPA review.

Seems easy, substantially increased traffic to the boats has a tangible
environmental impact e.g. pollution, littering, etc.

But I fail to see the same argument here... and I do desire to be enlightened.
There's probably something extremely simple that's just whooshing over my
head.

~~~
Isinlor
Some animals navigate using stars:
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5805938/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5805938/)

Starlink could potentially disrupt that. Most likely it will not, but who
knows.

One could also argue that satellites that do not fully burn in atmosphere
produce waste.

From legal perspective, I guess it's hard to argue that there is no impact, if
you do not asses the impact.

Overall, I don't think there is not much cause for concern for non-human
activities. And even for humans it's about astronomy and moving dots on night
sky outside urban areas.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
Artificial lighting on the surface has a far greater impact on wildlife.

~~~
nolok
But that doesn't say anything about the impact (or lack thereof) of StarLink
on wildlife.

~~~
arcticfox
It does say something about a precedent though.

I like protecting the environment, but the proposed scenario seems pretty
implausible to me.

------
tylfin
Do the satellites disrupt telescopes world wide? If that's the case it's
pretty tough on observatories that were recently built, at (apparently) a tens
of millions of dollar price tag, that are now impacted by the decision to
launch without proper oversight.

Obviously having more accessible internet for the rest of the world is a
positive.

Ref: [https://www.space.com/8791-giant-telescope-50-million-
fundin...](https://www.space.com/8791-giant-telescope-50-million-funding.html)

~~~
DennisP
Not only internet, but Starlink funds Starship and gives it enough payload to
start amortizing the rockets. With Starship launch prices at scale,
astronomers can have all sorts of space telescopes at their disposal, and it
won't cost much.

This isn't only because launch will be cheaper. Space hardware is expensive
mostly because it has to be both durable and lightweight. If launch is cheap,
it's fine for the hardware to be heavy, and if it breaks then it doesn't cost
much to replace it.

Beyond astronomy, Starlink revenue and Starship are the keys to becoming a
real space-faring society.

~~~
bathtub365
I really don't think it's a good thing for a company to cause problems for
ground-based astronomy in the name of selling space-based astronomy.

~~~
DennisP
It's in the name of expanding civilization beyond this planet, but sure,
space-based astronomy is one part of that.

However, I'm not claiming SpaceX will be selling space telescopes. They'll
just provide really cheap launch services to anyone who wants to launch one.

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tsukurimashou
I remember seeing the actual satellite being deployed live last year, I also
remember talking about it with my colleagues at the time (all in IT), none of
them had heard about Starlink.

It seems to me they tried to make as less noise as possible, once already
deployed it is harder to go back. I might be completely wrong but from my
perspective it really looked like "first we deploy the satellite then we take
care of advertising / telling people what this is about"

~~~
gonesilent
Elon does not like to spend much on marketing/ads.

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llboston
They need to consider that other countries might launch satellite
constellation too, such as China
[http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-07/03/c_138195322.htm](http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-07/03/c_138195322.htm)

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thelittleone
Can someone help me understand the difference between illegal and unlawful?

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JohnFen
You mean there may actually be some hope?? Wonders never cease...

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_trampeltier
Just start the satellites from another country.

~~~
gsich
Doesn't work that easily, unless SpaceX also moves to another country.

------
throwGuardian
The FCC will likely say: "Choose between high speed internet in rural areas,
and astronomer inconvenience"

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pledess
Another NEPA issue this week was the fuel dumping by Delta Flight 89 -
[https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/delta-777-dumps-fuel-
on-s...](https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/delta-777-dumps-fuel-on-school-
during-emergency-return-to-lax/)

I feel that aviation regulators should have addressed this a hundred years
ago. No aircraft that's above its maximum safe landing weight should ever have
been allowed to take off.

(I realize it's inconvenient to impose this regulation today. Maximum safe
landing weights can be a hundred thousand pounds less than maximum safe
takeoff weights.)

~~~
bdonlan
All planes can land safely at their MTOW. However, doing so may cause damage
that needs repair before a subsequent flight. It also means you need more
runway, which can limit your options or reduce safety margins.

