Impact of Satellite Constellations on Optical Astronomy and Recommendations Toward Mitigations

Abstract

This report was written by the members of the SATCON1 Scientific Organizing Committee (SOC). All members of the SOC had the opportunity to view, edit, and comment on the document. The views expressed in this paper represent the consensus of the SOC, and the views expressed are the opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation, NOIRLab, AURA or the American Astronomical Society, or any other organizations affiliated with the authors. SATCON1 co-chairs C. Walker and J. Hall thank the members of the SOC for their many contributions to making our online SATCON1 workshop a success and for their contributions to this report. We also thank the WG chairs (L. Allen, P. Seitzer, T. Tyson, and R. Green) and WG members for the substantial time and effort that went into writing their reports. Walker and Hall also acknowledge the input and effort by SpaceX engineers who participated in the SATCON1 workshop and in the working groups. We look forward to further work with SpaceX and other operators. The organizers thank the NSF’s Division of Astronomical Sciences (award AST-2021148) for financial support of the workshop.