China will launch an artificial moon to illuminate the night sky

The night sky may soon have company: Chinese scientists plan to launch an artificial moon in orbit by 2020 to illuminate the streets of the city at dusk.

Scientists hope to suspend the artificial moon over the city of Chengdu, the capital of China's Sichuan province, in southwestern China, according to a report in China's official media. The imitation of the celestial body – essentially an illuminated satellite – will carry a reflective coating to cast sunlight back to Earth, where it will complement street lighting at night.

Scientists have estimated that it could be eight times brighter than the original moon. It will also gravitate much closer to the Earth. about 500 km, against 380,000 km of the moon.

But the ambitious plan would still not have the effect of "brightening the entire night sky," said Wu Chunfeng, head of the Science Society of Tian Fu's new space, to China. Daily. "The expected brightness, in the eyes of humans, is about one-fifth of normal street lights."

Wu estimated that the new moons could allow the city of Chengdu to save about 1.2 billion yuan ($ 173 million) in electricity costs a year, and could even help first responders in case of power failure and natural disaster. If the project succeeds, it could be completed by three more additions to the night sky in 2022, he said.

Read more: Science: Mirror of Space

Mr. Wu added that many more tests had yet to be conducted to ensure that the plan was viable and would not have a detrimental effect on the natural environment.

"We will only test in an uninhabited desert so that our light beams do not interfere with anyone or with any Earth-based space observation equipment," he told reporters. . Daily.

China's space objectives are not unprecedented. In the 1990s, Russia experimented with the use of an orbital mirror to reflect sunlight on some of its sun-deprived northern cities, according to the New York Time. The project was abandoned in 1999 after the failure of the deployment of the mirror and its incineration in the atmosphere.

In January, the American company Rocket Lab launched an artificial star in space, the Time reported. But scientists have criticized the "Humanity Star", dubbed the thinking mini-satellite, for contributing to artificial light pollution and overcrowding of Earth's orbit.