Glasses in Space? The FCC Just Approved a Satellite That Reflects the Sun, and Astronomers Are Concerned

When people tarnish the sun in science fiction, it’s usually when a supervillain overshadows it and casts eternal darkness. A space technology company called Reflect Orbital wants to do the opposite: bring sunlight to the dark side of Earth courtesy of satellites equipped with giant mirrors. The FCC approved one satellite as an experimental demonstration on Thursday, and many scientists are already unhappy about it.

Green lights approval for Reflect Orbital to send its Eärendil-1 satellite into orbit. It is a relatively small spacecraft, weighing only 142 kilograms (313 pounds).

In its body is a square thin film mirror measuring 18 meters wide by 18 meters (about 60 by 60 feet). The satellite is scheduled to launch into space on a SpaceX Falcon 9 later in 2026.

Eärendil-1 promises to reflect sunlight on Earth in a 3-mile circle that can be aimed basically anywhere there is no sunlight. The company has a web tool that shows you what this could look like, and it’s wide enough to light up entire neighborhoods, making it look like daytime when it’s nighttime.

Obviously, this will be used to power the solar panels at night, thus overcoming their one major challenge: They can only collect energy during the day. According to Reflect Orbital, demand for electricity increases as the sun sets, which means that power companies must rely on other sources of energy to cope with the increased load. (Battery storage helps keep the sun’s energy flowing after sunset.) That increases fuel consumption, which which contributes to climate change.

Reflect Orbital says it wants to operate 50,000 of these satellites if the technology demonstration is successful. That would put 16.2 million square mirrors in low Earth orbit to illuminate large parts of the world where needed. Currently, only one Eärendil-1 satellite is authorized for launch.

Scientists say this could be a disaster

Academics have been opposing the launch of Eärendil-1 since long before FCC approval. More than 1,800 comments (PDF) were made during the proposal, and most were negative.

Researchers often agree that having 50,000 satellites beaming sunlight back to Earth could be as bad as a supervillain blocking sunlight altogether.

Several organizations have filed complaints, including the American Astronomical Society and advocacy group DarkSky International, citing potential problems with directing even a small amount of sunlight to Earth during the night.

“The concept of lighting the Earth from orbit represents a new phase of artificial night lighting with global environmental, cultural and regulatory implications,” DarkSky said in an open letter to Reflect Orbital. “Based on current scientific evidence, we do not see a viable way for this technology to be compatible with responsible lighting principles or with our mission to protect against environmental darkness.”

Astronomers are also high on the list of people opposed to a giant night-light mirror, noting that even a single mirror flying in front of a telescope could bypass sensitive equipment on Earth’s observatories. And since most astronomical research must be done periodically, given the motions of the vast universe, space mirrors that reflect sunlight can mean missed opportunities to gather valuable information.

Scientists were also unhappy with the idea that one company in one country could destroy the skies of the whole world.

Blue skies and light pollution

Olivier Hainaut, an astronomer at the European Southern Observatory outside Munich, Germany, and author of a 2026 study showing the effects of giant satellites on astronomy, says light scattering is a major problem.

“The light from the satellites will also be diffused into space, raising the brightness of the entire sky,” Hainaut said in an email. That is why the sky is blue during the day, because sunlight is scattered by the atmosphere, and the same effect would occur if thousands of satellites were to shine on the Earth. This light pollution will hamper stargazing efforts, even if the mirrors were not pointed directly at the observatories.

The American Astronomical Society noted that scattering of light in space can cause light pollution even in areas where mirrors do not reflect light directly. “An RO satellite like Eärendil-1 is expected to have a visible brightness of at least 2 to 4 times that of the full moon,” AAS said in a complaint (PDF) to the FCC.

Reflect Orbital notes that “there is no established regulatory framework for space-based energy and lighting services,” and says it is open to regulation and operations by scientists. The company also says it aims to learn from its test satellite before sending more satellites into space, and to do its best to avoid flashing its glasses in observatories.

Experts remain skeptical. Hainaut says Reflect Orbital has shown that large observatories can be safe for the company’s satellite constellation, but it’s surprising for university-scale observatories, novice astronomers, and casual skygazers. These are issues that Hainaut insists must be addressed before a large constellation is launched, but he says that a single satellite may have some value.

“While I’m against the deployment of a full constellation, I’m actually fine with a prototype,” Hainaut said. “It will give us (and everyone else) an opportunity to measure the object, find out how bright it is, and Reflect Orbital to show their capabilities (for their business) and mitigation methods that they think (for everyone else).”