Which in turns makes them a ridiculous waste of precious resources. We're literally letting expensive materials burn up in the atmosphere, and I don't like the idea of scaling this process up significantly.
I think the future may not lie in satellites - most of the tasks could be done by fleets of solar-powered high-altitude drones. With the added benefits of a) being hugely cheaper to launch, and b) much easier to fix and relaunch. I wonder what's the state of tech in that area?
Expensive materials? It's mostly aluminum and silicon...
Sure, there are trace amounts of precious metals in the circuitry and batteries, but hardly enough to worry about.
Drones sound far more expensive and complicated. Not only does it need all the complexity of this satellite, it also needs to be a high endurance autonomous drone...
> Drones sound far more expensive and complicated. Not only does it need all the complexity of this satellite, it also needs to be a high endurance autonomous drone...
Drones per se, yes, but a satellite also needs to reach orbital velocity to be anything more than an expensive metal brick. We do that using huge amounts of rocket fuel. So I think if you add in the costs of rocket, solar-powered UAVs would have a great price advantage. The complexity isn't that of a problem - satellites have to be simple because if something breaks in orbit, you'll need another rocket to get someone up there to fix it.
RE endurance requirements, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't upper atmosphere quite calm?
I think the future may not lie in satellites - most of the tasks could be done by fleets of solar-powered high-altitude drones. With the added benefits of a) being hugely cheaper to launch, and b) much easier to fix and relaunch. I wonder what's the state of tech in that area?