[b112]

There are literally enormous problems powering AI data centers on the Earth right now. No, we don't have the power on Earth.

In terms of launch cost, Starship makes launch cost negligible. Some estimates are that it will cost less to launch a tonne to orbit, than to ship across the US by train.

Even if this figure is slightly low, that has nothing compared to the cost of real estate, construction costs, all of the building codes required to build a data center on Earth. These things all still apply underground, and underground is going to require additional shoring and structural engineering, to ensure that the structure is not crushed, damaged, and so forth.

[yourusername]

>In terms of launch cost, Starship makes launch cost negligible. Some estimates are that it will cost less to launch a tonne to orbit, than to ship across the US by train.

So in this world vision obviously companies will start shipping iron ore and coal by starship from one coast to the other because it will be cheaper than trains. In fact all trucking worldwide would be replaced by space ships because they would be cheaper than trucks by far. I can't see how it will ever be cheaper to build a literal space ship and launch it than to put stuff on a train. This all reads like some super optimistic early 50's scifi.

[b112]

I didn't say it was cheaper to ship coast to coast by starship. I said some estimates predict it cheaper to ship to orbit, than train coast to coast.

You're also mysteriously adding in build cost for starship, and not the train. Starship is reusable.

To orbit

Think of how short a distance "to orbit" is.

[yourusername]

>Think of how short a distance "to orbit" is.

7.8 km/s delta-v, that's quite a lot.

>You're also mysteriously adding in build cost for starship, and not the train. Starship is reusable.

Even if both are reusable a train will last decades and a starship will be lucky to get a few dozen launches, which is still amazing mind you. Maybe it is my lack of imagination but i just can't see how a diesel engine that pulls a metal box at 60mph will cost more per trip than a rocket that has to accelerate to 18000 mph. Even just fueling: a train runs on diesel which is easy to handle and everywhere. Starship requires cryogenic fuel and oxidizer which is inherently more difficult to handle.

[ben_w]

> There are literally enormous problems powering AI data centers on the Earth right now.

Political, not technical.

Going to space replaces a domestic problem of angry locals with an international problem of angry governments.

> No, we don't have the power on Earth.

The power problem isn't meaningfully improved by going to space.

For every GW you put in a sun synchronous orbit to get permanent light, you need around 6 GW in the major world deserts given their cloud cover. But! The ones on the ground last 30-40 years, while the satellites are currently expected to get replaced every 5 years, so the quantity which need to be manufactured each year to maintain fixed useful output is actually about the same.

For scale:

The world installed 445 GW in 2024, and this number has a long term growth trend in the range of 25-35% per year.

If SpaceX's proposed million satellite constellation are each 25 kW modules, the total they need to launch is 25 GW, the ground equivalent is 25*6 GW = 150 GW, so we could deploy something of this scale on the ground three times over in 2024, and probably around 11-18 times in 2030 if trends continue.

And to pre-empt someone what-abouting night, between cars and PowerWall Tesla supplies about 150 GWh of batteries each year, so provided they didn't need replacing more often than every four years on average this would be enough to supply a data centre that size for 24 hours, long enough to wait for the sun to return and supply enough to be charging rather than draining batteries.

Of course, America only controls one such desert. China has another, makes most of the PV and far more batteries, but America wants to treat this situation as a race against China.

[bvcp]

now try to build this infrastructure project and get approvals at all levels of government in a time frame that doesnt see you fall behind

[ben_w]

Which needs more government approval, an unprecedented million satellites that impacts every nation, not just America but also several actively hostile to the US, or a very precedented million things with batteries in them (making them grid independent) on very cheap desert land? They don't need to be fixed buildings, they don't need humans inside (would suck if they did given the alternative is putting them in space), they don't need water (ditto), or AC (ditto).

[bvcp]

how does ai in space “impact every nation”