Every time a rocket launches, it produces a plume of exhaust in its wake that leaves a mark on the environment. These plumes are filled with materials that can collect in the air over time, potentially altering the atmosphere in dangerous ways. It’s a phenomenon that’s not well-understood, and some scientists say we need to start studying these emissions now before the number of rocket launches increases significantly.

It’s not the gas in these plumes that’s most concerning. Some rockets do produce heat-trapping greenhouse gases, like carbon dioxide, but those emissions are negligible, according to experts. “The rocket business could grow by a factor of 1,000 and the carbon dioxide and water vapor emissions would still be small compared to other industrial sources,” Martin Ross, a senior project engineer at the Aerospace Corporation who studies the effects of rockets on the atmosphere, tells The Verge.

Instead, it’s tiny particles that are produced inside the trail that we need to watch out for, Ross says. Small pieces of soot and a chemical called alumina are created in the wakes of rocket launches. They then get injected into the stratosphere, the layer of Earth’s atmosphere that begins six miles up and ends around 32 miles high. Research shows that this material may build up in the stratosphere over time and slowly lead to the depletion of a layer of oxygen known as the ozone. The ozone acts like a big shield, protecting Earth against the Sun’s harmful ultraviolet radiation. However, the magnitude of this ozone depletion isn’t totally known, says Ross.

“It’s a call for more research in this area to know exactly what we’re putting into the upper atmosphere and in what quantities.”

That’s why he and others at the Aerospace Corporation, a nonprofit that provides research and guidance on space missions, are calling for more studies. They say it’s especially important now since the private space industry is at the early stages of a launch revolution. Currently, the number of launches each year is relatively small, around 80 to 90, so the aerospace industry’s impact on the atmosphere is not much of a concern. But in a new paper published in April, Ross and his colleague Jim Vedda argue that as launches increase, policymakers will eventually want to know what kind of damage these vehicles are causing to the environment and if regulations are necessary. When that time comes, it will be better to have as much data as possible to make the best decisions.

“It’s a call for more research in this area to know exactly what we’re putting into the upper atmosphere and in what quantities,” Vedda, a senior policy analyst at the Aerospace Corporation, tells The Verge. “So when the debates start, we have the good hard data that says, ‘Here’s a well-defined model of what’s actually happening.’”

So far, the research we have about these emissions mostly comes from lab experiments, modeling, and some direct detections of rocket plumes. At the turn of the century, a few high-altitude planes equipped with sensors flew through plumes created by the Space Shuttle and other vehicles to figure out what was inside.

It turns out that all kinds of rockets produce these emissions, but some types of vehicles produce more than others. Rockets that run on solid propellants produce a higher amount of alumina particles, a combination of aluminum and oxygen that is white and reflective. Most orbital rockets don’t run on solid propellants these days, though some launch companies like the United Launch Alliance do add solid rocket boosters to vehicles to give them extra thrust. Meanwhile, rockets that run on liquid kerosene, a type of refined oil, produce more of the dark soot particles, what is known as black carbon. Kerosene is used as a propellant for rockets such as ULA’s Atlas V and SpaceX’s Falcon 9.

all kinds of rockets produce these emissions, but some types of vehicles produce more than others

Alumina and black carbon from rockets can stick around in the stratosphere for three to five years, according to Ross. As these materials collect high above the Earth, they can have interesting effects on the air. Black carbon forms a thin layer that intercepts and absorbs the sunlight that hits Earth. “It would act as a thin, black umbrella,” says Ross. That may help keep the lower atmosphere cool, but the intercepted energy from the Sun doesn’t just go away; it gets deposited into the stratosphere, warming it up. This warming ultimately causes chemical reactions that could lead to the depletion of the ozone layer.

The reflective alumina particles can also affect the ozone but in a different way. Whereas the soot acts like a black umbrella, the alumina acts like a white one, reflecting sunlight back into space. However, chemical reactions occur on the surface of these white particles, which, in turn, destroy the ozone layer, Ross says.

Black carbon and alumina have actually been proposed by scientists as possible geoengineering agents or tools for cooling down our warming climate. But while they may keep the lower atmosphere cool, geoengineering agents may have other unwanted side effects, too. They might interact with jet streams, causing droughts or more tropical storms. That’s why many scientists have criticized the idea of geoengineering to combat climate change.

However, rockets are putting these particles into the air no matter what, and this byproduct of ozone loss is particularly concerning for Ross and Vedda. As the ozone diminishes, more of the Sun’s harmful radiation could reach the ground. These UVB rays can cause skin cancer and cataracts. “That’s what we need to understand — the ozone depletion aspect of this because protection of the ozone layer is an international imperative,” says Ross. The 1987 Montreal Protocol, for example, is an international agreement to phase out materials that deplete the ozone.

Right now, Ross estimates that rocket launches around the world inject 10 gigagrams, or 11,000 tons, of soot and alumina particles into the atmosphere each year. But that number could be going up. SpaceX has vowed to increase the number of launches it does each year, and numerous other companies are going to start launching their own vehicles soon. What kind of impact that will have on the atmosphere is unclear. That’s why Ross and Vedda suggest the government and universities invest in a series of research programs, in which scientists collect more data on rocket particles from aircraft and satellites.

“We want to be proactive before this tipping point occurs.”

“All of this plays into the scenario in which we’re envisioning a very significant increase in the number of launches, as these very large satellite constellations are deployed and as more nations get involved in space activities,” says Vedda. “Rocket emissions have been a pretty minuscule part of the emissions into the atmosphere, but this is going to change as the activity accelerates.”

Vedda and Ross argue we should get ahead of the pollution issue before it has more drastic consequences, as we should have done with space debris. In the early days of spaceflight, no one was really concerned with how many spacecraft were put into space. But soon, experts recognized that this space debris could collide and build up over time, making low Earth orbit unusable someday. So now, there are regulations in place to prevent the problem from getting worse, but a lot of the damage had already been done.

The researchers hope to be much more prepared about these rocket emissions: study as much as we can now, so we can make the best policy decisions in the future. “At some point, there will be a tipping point where all of a sudden, everybody says, ‘Wait a minute we need to understand this better,’” says Ross. “We want to be proactive before this tipping point occurs.”