NextBigFuture by Brian Wang 2/19/2024
The US military will need to build hundreds of Mechazilla launch towers by 2030.
The US military is planning to get to thousands of SpaceX flights per year and this will mean that the US military will need hundreds of Mechazilla launch towers.
SpaceX, the US Air Force and the US Space Force discussions about military uses for Starship were partially revealed at a recent conference.
As of February 2023, SpaceX’s Mechazilla launch towers are estimated to cost less than $100 million each. This cost did not go up that much with the water deluge system. The metal launch tower segments are not expensive, and the towers have robotic arms and the power to operate them. The US military is clearly eyeing thousands of flights per year using SpaceX Starship and hundreds of Mechazilla launch facilities. One hundred Mechazilla launch tower bases would cost about $10 billion.
The US military is worried about China building many more space launch facilities. The US military has about 850 military bases around the world. Just connecting the largest military bases would need about 90 launch towers. IF they are flying each Starship twice per day for cargo, then a twenty Starship fleet would be 40 flights per day would be about 14000 flights per year. Twenty Starships would need about 120 SpaceX Raptor engines. IF the Starships could only fly 100 times before a major refit or replacement then they would need replacement or refit every two months.
Mass produced Starship with $250,000 per engine would cost about $4 to 10 million each. As of January 2022, the Boeing C-17 Globemaster III military jet costs around $340 million. $24 to $60 million per year for refit or replaced Starships would be still be cheaper and faster than the C-17 Globemaster III. The C-17 costs about $22000 per hour to operate and has 85 tons of payload capacity. The SpaceX Starship can have two to three times the payload capacity and would fly fifteen to thirty times faster than the C-17. This would mean the SpaceX Starship could do 40 to eighty times what the Globemaster does in an hour. This would justify up to $800k per hour for a SpaceX Starship transportation system.
Proof that US Military is Thinking about Thousands of SpaceX Starship per Year
If the US military is going to get to thousands of SpaceX flights per year, then the US military will need a hundred Mechazilla launch towers.
More:
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2024/02/spacex-and-us-military-will-need-to-mass-produce-hundreds-of-mechazilla-launch-towers.html
