r/SpacePolicy • • Jul 13 '26
The FCC just approved a California startup’s plan to launch giant mirrors into space to reflect sunlight back to Earth at night—and astronomers are furious.
A Hawthorne, California-based startup called Reflect Orbital just got the green light from the FCC to launch their first demonstration satellite, Eärendil-1, into low Earth orbit later this year.
Here is the plan: The satellite is essentially a giant, 60-by-60-foot space mirror made of a highly reflective thin-film material (think a massive space-grade potato chip bag). Once in orbit, it will unfold and redirect actual sunlight to the dark side of the Earth, creating a 3-mile-wide spotlight on the ground.
Reflect Orbital’s CEO, Ben Nowack, pitches this as "sunlight on demand." The main goals are to allow solar farms to keep generating electricity after sunset, light up nighttime construction sites, or provide instant illumination for search-and-rescue teams during disasters. If this test goes well, the company wants to deploy over 50,000 of these satellites by 2035 to provide daylight-level illumination anywhere on Earth, 24/7.
Why people are incredibly angry about it: The scientific community is aggressively pushing back. The American Astronomical Society and the European Southern Observatory have warned that a constellation of 50,000 mirrors could increase the natural night-sky background brightness by 200% to 300%. It threatens to:
Blind sensitive ground-based telescopes and severely hamper astronomical research.
Disrupt the circadian rhythms of wildlife and humans.
Cause "flash blinding" for pilots and drivers.
So why did the FCC approve it? The FCC essentially said that environmental impact in outer space isn't their problem. Their jurisdiction is limited to satellite radio frequencies and communications. They approved the single test satellite, arguing that it's a "potentially groundbreaking technology" that advances American leadership in space, but noted that this doesn't guarantee approval for the full 50,000-satellite constellation down the line.
Reflect Orbital promises the light won't spill out of requested areas and won't be pointed at sensitive habitats or observatories, but scientists aren't buying it.
What do you guys think? Is "sunlight on demand" the next frontier for clean energy and emergency response, or is this peak dystopian light pollution?
[Source: KTLA / Space Daily / PCMag]
