Member-only story
Musk’s Orbital Data Centre Idea Is Getting More Stupid By The Day
How does anyone believe this?
Whatever Musk has been smoking, I don’t want any, because it seems his last few functioning neurons have fallen out of his nose. Originally, his orbital data idea was laughable. But now that details have emerged about how Musk plans to pull off this grand scheme, it seems even more idiotic than once believed. These are either the drivelings of a power-crazed moron or something more insidious is going on.
Let’s start at the beginning. Despite what Musk claims, orbital AI data centres are not cheaper than terrestrial ones. As I have covered before, it costs roughly nine times more to launch AI data centres into space than to operate them here on Earth, so even during an energy crisis, orbital data centres are significantly more expensive. On top of that, it would cost tens of trillions of dollars to build and deploy the 100 GW of solar arrays to space that Musk has promised, and they would need to be completely replaced every five years or so when the satellites they are attached to deorbit. Oh, and building these satellites on the Moon, as Musk has suggested, doesn’t solve any of these problems and, in fact, will make them worse. Yet, Musk still wants to deploy an orbital AI data centre constellation of one million satellites!
