Darkest Nights Are Getting Lighter (ieee.org) 26
Light pollution now doubles every eight years globally as LED adoption accelerates artificial brightness worldwide. A recent study measured 10% annual growth in light pollution from 2011 to 2022. Northern Chile's Atacama Desert remains one of the few Bortle Scale 1 locations -- the darkest rating for astronomical observation -- though La Serena's population has nearly doubled in 25 years. The region hosts major observatories including the Vera C. Rubin Observatory at Cerro Pachon.
Satellite constellations pose additional challenges: numbers have increased from hundreds decades ago to 12,000 currently operating satellites. Astronomers predict 100,000 or more satellites within a decade. Chile faces pressure from proposed mining operations including the 7,400-acre INNA green-hydrogen facility near key astronomical sites despite national laws limiting artificial light from mining operations that generate over half the country's exports.
Satellite constellations pose additional challenges: numbers have increased from hundreds decades ago to 12,000 currently operating satellites. Astronomers predict 100,000 or more satellites within a decade. Chile faces pressure from proposed mining operations including the 7,400-acre INNA green-hydrogen facility near key astronomical sites despite national laws limiting artificial light from mining operations that generate over half the country's exports.
Lost Cause (Score:5, Insightful)
Outside of a very small community (of which I am a member) this won't even register as a problem, let alone motivate a sizeable number of people to do anything about it. Our species lacks the will to even stop literally poisoning ourselves.
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Hear, hear! They upgraded the street light outside my home last year, and now the light is so nice and bright that I'm pulling down a lot of supplementary income doing night dentistry on the sidewalk. I'm not licensed, but I don't need to be, it's so bright.
To human priorities!
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It sounds like a Musk Huffer. Which is the same thing, I guess.
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Bless your simple little heart.
Evidence Suggests Otherwise (Score:2)
More light directly translates into lower crime rates and higher social activity and human happiness.
Really? The article points out that the amount of light we generate has more than doubled since 2011 and somehow I don't feel that human happiness levels have increased or that crime has decreased and while perhaps social activity has increased a fair amount of that seems to be people protesting about how unhappy they are so I'm not sure it helps your claim.
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>> Because it's not a problem. More light directly translates into lower crime rates and higher social activity and human happiness.
This is just one side of the coin. Does not mean that the light pollution does not have a dark side.
>> The fact that you are in a very tiny minority that cares about the issue should inform you as to how important it really is against the larger picture of humans conquering this planet and preparing to expand outwards.
As opposed to being invaded by space bugs becaus
Re: Lost Cause (Score:1)
I take it your LED lights at home are at least 1500 lumens and 6000k?
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Outside of a very small community (of which I am a member) this won't even register as a problem, let alone motivate a sizeable number of people to do anything about it. Our species lacks the will to even stop literally poisoning ourselves.
There are just too many things to be outraged about these days. I can either be a tiny bit outraged at a whole bunch of things, or I can be really outraged at a handful of things and simply not care about the rest. My personal negativity setting does not go high enough to be really outraged about everything.
And either way, this one is definitely low on my list.
Visiting the moon to see they Milky Way (Score:2)
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That's already mostly true. The last time I could clearly see it was in my childhood on a remote country gravel road. Even now, driving to that same spot I can't even see very many stars.
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Re: Visiting the moon to see they Milky Way (Score:2)
Even in the rural Midwest, farms have much more night lighting than undeveloped land out west.
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take trips beyond the satellite cloud
It's not a satellite cloud, it's an unevenly distributed Dyson sphere!
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Visiting the moon? Anybody knows you need a moonless night to get a good view of the milky way, so that is about the dumbest thing ever.
And on a lightly more serious note, the satellite constellations are in low orbit, only visible for 1-2 hours after sunset, until they are fully in the Earth's shadow.
Don't you folks have any forrest, or other natural park you can visit, to get away from the lights?
Gas stations (Score:3)
These days, gas stations don't just light up the area where the pumps are. They deliberately attach very bright lights to their canopies, aimed at nearby traffic, so drivers see a bright glare. I suppose they are hoping it will seem attractive to said drivers.
These gas stations are a problem even in rural areas.
Clamp down on them, and probably 50% of the problem is gone.
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What's weird is having sign height ordinances and not having rules about lighting. Unlike tall signs, this is literally an eyesore while driving at night. Have to look away.
Seems counter-intuitive (Score:2)
LED lights are extremely directional, to the point it can be difficult getting them to diffuse like an incandescent bulb. Most streetlights (and now, lights in sports stadiums, parking lots and the like) are extremely directional, pointing straight down and having abrupt drop-off in illumination around the periphery. In fact, in my town, streetlights that are being replaced with LED are not as good because they don't cover as large of an area or fade out on the edges in a more natural way. They almost look
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I've noticed that fade out effect not being there on street lights. I hadn't put that together until you just spelled it out though. I don't know if it's just because it was "different back then" but I don't like the extreme change, versus how it use to naturally fade.
I am surprised we are putting off MORE light then we were though. I keep reading how we are actively trying to push back on light pollution, so that's yet another distressing thing that's happening.
I definitely remember seeing a lot more stars
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So I guess the light pollution from LEDs is due to light reflecting off the ground?
Higher frequencies are preferentially scattered. Most LED street lamps operate at higher frequencies than the HPS they replaced.
Less power, more light (Score:2)
LEDs are a lot more efficient, so you can get a lot more light with a lot less power consumption and heat. This lets you get a lot more light out of a smaller fixture before hear buildup becomes an issue, and you can afford more lamps for the same power budget. That means more light being produced. And yes, a lot of light pollution is reflected light.
I've brought europeans (Score:4)
where I live, they can't believe there are so many stars. They have never seen the milky way.
no evil will escape our sight. (Score:2)
In brightest day and darkest night, we will still be able to see everything. So no evil will escape our sight.
Except of course for evil from the stars, cause we won't see crap.
Seriously, that is still one of the benefits of living in the boonies. There are still places we can go more than 10 m iles from other people and have a nice, clear night sky.
But not in my home.