I. Impacts to the natural and human environment identified or predicted from launching satellite constellations include:
a. Large quantities of CO2, NOx, water vapor, and other greenhouse gases and toxic substances are produced by combustion of liquid and/or solid fuel during rocket launches (see Dallas et al., 2020 for a comprehensive review). Depending on the type of fuel used and the size of the launching rocket, up to 300 tons of CO2 can be produced per launch. The breakdown of water vapor released in the stratosphere leads to depletion of the ozone layer (Marais, 2021).
b. Combustion of kerosene fuel produces black carbon, and combustion of solid rocket fuel produces soot and alumina, both of which can affect the albedo (reflectivity) of Earth’s atmosphere to sunlight (Lawler & Boley, 2021).
c. Pollution associated with rocket launches, including over sensitive habitats such as the Gulf Coast in Texas and Cape Canaveral in Florida, negatively impacts humans and wildlife alike. Rocket launching facilities that are placed in environmentally delicate areas and/or near lowincome or marginalized people raise questions about environmental justice and equity, e.g., the SpaceX spaceport near Boca Chica, TX (Sandoval & Webner, 2021).
d. Falling debris and explosions associated with failed rocket launches have raised concerns and protest among neighbors of proposed launching sites, e.g., Little Cumberland Island, Georgia, where Camden County plans a new spaceport (Marvar, 2021).
II. Impacts on the natural and human environment identified or predicted from operating LEO satellites at orbit-raising and final station altitude include:
a. Possible disruption of various species’ ability to navigate using the stars. A wide range of species are suspected or known to use the stars and even the Milky Way to navigate (e.g., Foster et al., 2018; Sokol, 2021; Fritts 2021), from dung beetles (Foster et al., 2021) to bats (Stone, Harris & Jones, 2015), harbor seals (Mauck et al., 2008), and migratory songbirds (Emlen, 1967; Wiltschko et al., 1987; Pakhomov, Anashina & Chernetsov, 2017). The possibility that the proliferation of bright artificial LEO satellites could lead to the disruption of migration by many millions or billions of individual animals (Lintott & Lintott, 2020) is still new enough just two years after the first launch of Starlink satellites that no peer-reviewed studies have been published yet reporting confirmed impacts of satellite constellations on animals; however, numerous members of the working group felt that there was sufficient reason to be concerned about such possible effects on animals that the precautionary principle should apply, and that launches should be halted unless and until the effects are demonstrated to be negligible.
b. Interference with the timeless and profound human experience of regarding the starry sky. The night sky is a fundamental part of nature, and one that provides us with solace, inspiration, and connection with countless generations before us and, one hopes, yet to come. The human right to see the naturally dark, unpolluted, starry night sky has been articulated in the Declaration in Defense of the Night Sky and the Right to Starlight (Starlight Foundation, 2007), and Resolution B5 in Defence of the Night Sky and the Right to Starlight (International Astronomical Union, 2009), and by the US National Park Service, which operates an extraordinarily popular Night Skies program whose motto is “Half the Park is After Dark” and whose philosophy is that naturally dark skies are, like clean air and clean
