Energy & Science
Can We Get to Space Without Huge Carbon Emissions?
Up and coming space ‘boy scouts’ want to clean up the race to the stars.
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When a SpaceX Falcon Heavy blasts off on a plume of white smoke, hot gases shoot out of its 27 engines, creating a thrust equal to 18 Boeing 747 aircraft.
Upon reaching orbit, the world’s heaviest operational rocket will have burnt about 400 metric tons of kerosene and emitted more carbon-dioxide in a few minutes than an average car would in more than two centuries. That kind of shock to the atmosphere is stoking concerns about the impact that launching into orbit has on Earth, and it’s about to get worse.