Planned satellite constellations may swamp future orbiting telescopes

Planned orbital observatories would see satellites cross nearly all of their images.

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[Dioptase]

Part of the problem is going to be an overcapacity issue. The most obvious is the duplication of capacity caused by the Chinese and US constellations. It's safe to assume each country isn't going to permit ground stations or terminals from the other.

One possible solution is permitting some sort of version of internet peering or transit. The constellation owners make some sort of deal (blessed by their respective governments) that allows encrypted data links between satellites and ground that are only decrypted once they have reached an approved decryption gateway to the internet.

For example, a Starlink terminal in the US might link to a Chinese satellite using a Starlink account. The Chinese satellite links to a Chinese owned ground-station (maybe in the US, maybe not). The ground station connects to the approved gateway (much like an IPX). In theory, the Chinese portion of the network can't tell what the data is, but now Starlink can get by with fewer satellites. And visa versa.

Obviously you'd restrict such links to only non critical stuff. For example, nothing national security related.

Basically a satellite equivalent to internet peering that avoids every company needing to run fiber from coast to coast.

But I don't see this happening any time soon.

 

[Dioptase]

The US and EU constellations provide internet access. The Chinese constellations provide Chinese network access. They're not duplication of capacity because they're not offering the same thing.

Hmmm, well every article I find says they are providing internet. One has signed an agreement with Brazil and is in talks with 30 countries as of February this year. Sounds like they are offering nearly the same thing to me. How successful they will be remains to be seen, but having two or more sets of satellites provide the same service in orbit because some need to be inactive over certain geographic areas for political reasons would seem to me to be causing duplication of capacity.

 

[Dioptase]

It's duplication of hardware, perhaps. It's not duplication of capacity. Starlink's capacity as it flies over Shanghai is zero.

Way to miss the entire point, dude. If hardware is being duplicated, then why not figure out a way to not have to duplicate it? The reason for such duplication is lack of trust, not technical.

Starlink does have capacity over Shanghai. It's not allowed to operate there. Granted, there may be some signal differences that current satellites can't handle. But solving that is minor compared to the trust problem.

My entire point was that under the right agreements that satisfy the Chinese government (and the US, and other parties), it could be allowed to operate there. Absent such sort of framework, you have to have enough Chinese satellites to satisfy that market AND enough satellites to satisfy the US market. And it gets worse as you add other mutually exclusive systems.

 

[Dioptase]

Sure. That could happen.

Right after all countries around the world stop burning fossil fuels and unicorns fly out of my ass.

On that, we agree.