Space tourism could negatively affect the environment

Suborbital space tourism

A recent study, to be published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, examined the climate impact of soot and carbon dioxide emissions from 1,000 suborbital rocket flights per year and found that soot – not carbon dioxide – would potentially contribute the most to climate change.

"Rockets are the only direct source of human-produced compounds above about 14 miles (22.5 kilometers) and so it is important to understand how their exhaust affects the atmosphere," said Martin Ross, the study’s chief author and a scientist with the Aerospace Corporation in El Segundo, California.

Ozone layer

Additionally, the ozone would be affected, with equatorial regions losing about one percent and the poles gaining nearly 10 percent

Small input of black carbon(soot) is surprising

"The response of the climate system to a relatively small input of black carbon is surprising," says Michael Mills of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, a study coauthor, "and our results show particular climate system sensitivity to the type of particles that rockets emit."

source: propel-earth-initiatives.com