Why is it that climate-change-people rarely focus on the impact of Space Travel when it comes to green house gasses and the hole in the ozone layer? I asked a guy last night that was "environmentally conscious" to name me the things that he felt were most damaging to the environment and the ozone layer...and he ran through the usual suspects...coal, fossil fuels, SUV's...you get the idea...but he never mentioned Space Travel. Man first started to litterally pierce the ozone layer, and then expose it to mass amounts of exhaust, repeatedly, with a great intensity of intervals in the 1950's. When was the hole in the ozone layer first discovered? What has happened to that hole since? I tried to figure out how many launches there have been since 1950, and I lost track some place around 1958...it was a crazy number...if anyone can post the actual, total number of launches of space vehicles in the history of man, I would appreciate it. Now today, the space shuttle goes up, or a new rocket goes up and we are all like it's a trip to the grocery store. I am not some sort of environmental-wacko with a theory, nor do I think that space travel alone had a greater impact on the climate change and green house gasses than any other factor...just curious if anyone has thoughts on the subject, and if they ever considered that premise before. My apologies if this subject is a re-run, I am new around here.
Yes, a rocket produces alot of toxic gasses, which is one reason why space planes are a hot area of research. I disagree with your notion that a physical disturbance in the ozone layer has a lasting effect on it.
Do you see that there might be a correlation? I think the hole was discovered in 1985...and you would be astounded by the number of launches since the inception of space travel...and that space travel goes through the ozone layer, expelling what you mentioned were "a lot of toxic gasses"... If I had a wall of pure oxygen, and drove my SUV through it repeatedly, wouldn't you find traces of the exhaust? I would think you would...and if that exhaust is proven to cause holes in the "wall"...well...
So I just tried to google the answer to my question of number of launches...some guy did this, so I cut and pasted...it's up to 2006 and the % represents the number of successful attempts: 1957 2 1 66.7% 1958 7 20 25.9% 1959 12 10 54.5% 1960 21 18 53.8% 1961 37 16 69.8% 1962 70 13 84.3% 1963 53 17 75.7% 1964 89 14 86.4% 1965 117 14 89.3% 1966 124 14 89.9% 1967 127 15 89.4% 1968 121 9 93.1% 1969 108 18 85.7% 1970 113 11 91.1% 1971 120 15 88.9% 1972 107 8 93.0% 1973 108 8 93.1% 1974 105 7 93.8% 1975 124 7 94.7% 1976 127 5 96.2% 1977 123 6 95.3% 1978 122 5 96.1% 1979 104 5 95.4% 1980 102 6 94.4% 1981 122 3 97.6% 1982 118 10 92.2% 1983 126 2 98.4% 1984 127 1 99.2% 1985 119 5 96.0% 1986 101 8 92.7% 1987 107 6 94.7% 1988 114 6 95.0% 1989 100 1 99.0% 1990 114 6 95.0% 1991 86 4 95.6% 1992 93 4 95.9% 1993 78 5 94.0% 1994 88 5 94.6% 1995 72 7 91.1% 1996 70 6 92.1% 1997 83 5 94.3% 1998 76 5 93.8% 1999 69 8 89.6% 2000 80 4 95.2% 2001 56 2 96.6% 2002 60 4 93.8% 2003 60 2 96.8% 2004 51 3 94.4% 2005 51 3 94.4% 2006 40 4 90.9% It comes out to 4,000+ launch attempts, not counting 2007. So, the ozone layer has been penetrated by a space vehicle, emitting mass amounts of toxic gasses over 4,000 times in the last 50 years. I am no rocket scientist, but I would think that there has to be some sort of correlation there, no?
Although this is difficult to measure, I would say the supporting industry for space travel is a great pollutant. Factories for developing and making rockets, fuels, launch sites, all the vehicles and machinery necessary to run the whole thing.
