China Plans To Put Luminous Artificial Moon In Orbit To Light Streets At Night

China intends to launch a luminous artificial satellite into geosynchronous orbit above Chengdu (the capital of China’s southwestern Sichuan province) by 2020, to help supplement street lights at night and save as much as $173-million on electricity annually. THE FUTURE.

Scientists estimated that it could be eight times more luminous than the actual, original moon. It will also orbit much closer to Earth; about 500 km (310 miles) away, compared to the moon’s 380,000 km (236,000 miles).

But the ambitious plan still wouldn’t “light up the entire night sky,” Wu Chunfeng, chief of the Tian Fu New Area Science Society, told China Daily. “Its expected brightness, in the eyes of humans, is around one-fifth of normal streetlights.”

Man, that’s nuts. I just hope it doesn’t confuse wildlife. Officials say if the artificial moon project is successful they could potentially add three more by 2022. That’s a lot of moons! Alternatively, and I’m just throwing this out there, we should add another sun instead so it’s never night and we’re all driven mad and kill each other, the end.

Thanks to T-Pain, who agrees we should just nuke the actual moon into pieces and see what happens. You know, experiment.