Lights drown out Milky Way for third of world’s population

Scientists believe one-third of humanity can not view the Milky Way – this includes 80% of Americans and 60% of Europeans because city lights are creating fogs of light pollution, according to a new study that published Friday in the journal of Science Advances.

“Humanity has enveloped our planet in a luminous fog that prevents most of Earth’s population from having the opportunity to view our galaxy”, the researchers behind the light pollution atlas wrote on Friday in the journal Science Advances.

“The entire population lives under skies so bright that the eye can not fully dark-adapt to night vision”, according to the study. By population, Singapore has the world’s most light-polluted skies, followed by Kuwait, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates-all densely populated countries. According to researchers, an estimated 99 percent of European and USA populations live under light-polluted skies. In addition to a world map, the scientists provide tables showing the area of each country and what fraction of its population live under highly light polluted skies. In Western Europe, only a few small areas remain where the night sky remains relatively unpolluted, including areas in Scotland, Sweden, Norway, and parts of Spain and Austria.

Researchers from Italy, Germany, the United States and Israel joined Fabio Falchi in carrying out the research, which was conducted by the Italian Light Pollution Science and Technology Institute (ISTIL).

Chris Elvidge of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a co-author of the study, added that the times he has seen the Milky Way have been magical experiences.

Katie Davis of the Center for Biological Diversity explained in a separate press release, “to protect wildlife, we must protect wild places and the dark skies that stretch above them”. “Big Bend National Park is right up there as the one of the darkest”.

Canada’s skies are nowhere that pristine, but we compare favourably to other G20 countries in terms of percentage of territory with clear skies, at nearly 90 per cent of non-polluted night sky, second only to Australia.

If you’re looking for the largest swaths of dark sky, Canada and Australia are your best bets. “Losing a clear night sky will harm our capacity for wonder and put a dent in our spirit of common cause”. Even in cities such as Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, the night sky was at the low end of a sky brightness scale.

The atlas, which covers over 80 percent of the world, was created over a course of over 10 years using data gathered by the NOAA-NASA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership satellite and verified through ground-based measurements. “Pristine night skies are a precious merchandise”.

Tall tale? Maybe. But the phenomenon of city lights blowing out the natural light of the stars is real – and it’s getting worse.

Light pollution contributes to many problems of our civilization.

The selection of a light fixture and the bulb, however, can make a huge difference in how much light escapes into the sky.

“Our mission to preserve and protect the canyon for future generations is important during the day – and also at night”, Susan Schroeder, CEO of the Grand Canyon Association, said in a statement. The technique was then combined with data gathered from more than 30,000 sky brightness monitors, so that the level of light pollution could be known in a radius of around 120 miles from any given location. Dark sky-friendly lighting does exist, but it’s frankly not at the forefront of the minds that build skyscrapers that light up cities in even the darkest nights.