
Why Bezos’ rocket is unprecedented–and worth taking seriously - ghosh
http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/did-the-fourth-richest-human-just-tease-plans-to-colonize-the-moon/
======
paulsutter
Bezos' ambition is space manufacturing/mining, contrasted with Elon's dream of
Mars colonization. It will be interesting to see how that affects the way
things play out.

Elon's greatest contribution is to raise the bar for everyone else. I hope
Bezos accomplishes great things in space too.

~~~
astrodust
It's highly probable that if the space mining operation succeeds they will be
an invaluable supplier for the Mars colonization project. It's much cheaper to
transport materials from space to Mars than from Earth to Mars.

~~~
coolspot
BTW I have ordered 100,000 tons of iron on prime.amazon.com.mars and it still
in status "pending", they even didn't charge my SolarPay account.

~~~
astrodust
I've heard they're having drone delivery problems because of unusual solar
flare activity and probable sabotage from the AI running Uber Shuttle as
protest against stricter limits on the sorts of cargo that service can carry.

Apparently the solar system government is damage that needs to be routed
around.

------
garyclarke27
Interesting that Bezos new rocket will be using Liquified Natural Gas, LNG.
Cheap and I suspect inherently safer and eaiser to handle than Kerosene or
Hydrogen, though slightly less energy dense. Safer because is same temp as
Liquid Oxygen, SpaceX may I think have caused reliability problems for
themselves using super cooled Oxygen.

~~~
perseusprime11
In this context, I like this article from NASA that talks about Liquid
Hydrogen as the fuel of choice for space exploration:
[http://www.nasa.gov/content/liquid-hydrogen-the-fuel-of-
choi...](http://www.nasa.gov/content/liquid-hydrogen-the-fuel-of-choice-for-
space-exploration)

~~~
greglindahl
Yeah, reading that you would be surprised to learn that the lower stage of
every launcher flying or in development doesn't use liquid hydrogen[1].

(1: OK Ariane 5/6 but most of the thrust is from solids)

~~~
ashamedpedant
>flying or in development

You've forgotten about ULA's Delta IV and Delta IV Heavy, NASA's SLS, and
JAXA's H-IIA and H-IIB.

Delta IV Heavy is currently the most capable rocket in the world and uses
liquid hydrogen throughout (no solid boosters).

------
hourislate
I only wish Bezos success in this endeavor.

I had a chance to visit Johnson Space Center last summer and it was like a
space lovers pilgrimage to witness the miracles of science and man.

The Saturn V is on display and it was so amazing taking it all in. It is
massive. It is hard to imagine it can even leave the ground.

I took a few pictures (potato quality)

[http://imgur.com/a/hsr00](http://imgur.com/a/hsr00)

~~~
unethical_ban
I grew up around JSC in the 90s and 2000s and driving by the Saturn was
routine. It wasn't til 2 years ago that I actually bought a ticket, went in,
and browsed the site with the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo rockets. (I know a
tad bit about the space program, which is mountains more than most of the
tourists there).

------
banku_brougham
i really enjoy space movies, and i like the nasa missions of history and this
excellent Blue Origin project. I wish i had studied orbital physics or
something, and work at Blue Origin or the JPL. But, imagining the galactic
history books of the future, I'm also at peace with the idea that the earth is
the first and only home of humanity.

~~~
JorgeGT
“Our remote descendants, safely arrayed on many worlds throughout the Solar
System and beyond, will be unified by their common heritage, by their regard
for their home planet, and by the knowledge that, whatever other life may be,
the only humans in all the Universe come from Earth. They will gaze up and
strain to find the blue dot in their skies. They will love it no less for its
obscurity and fragility. They will marvel at how vulnerable the repository of
all our potential once was, how perilous our infancy, how humble our
beginnings, how many rivers we had to cross before we found our way.” ~ Carl
Sagan.

Bonus: with music
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oY59wZdCDo0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oY59wZdCDo0)

~~~
tobtoh
I do like that quote ... but it did get me thinking about my own
circumstances.

As someone who believes that we probably evolved/migrated out of Africa, I
feel no unity or connection to that continent. I only really feel a connection
for my home town (in Australia) where I was born (I've moved to a different
state since then).

So I suspect, in the far future when we colonise many worlds, there won't
actually be much of a connection.

~~~
zdkl
I think this quote takes it sense when you consider it from a deeper
perspective. "This is the place your *{great}-grandpa came from"

~~~
saiya-jin
which... you can say about Africa too, just add enough "great-" words before

------
jsprogrammer
An electromagnetic launcher seems to be the way to go. Why is everyone
spending time on rockets?

~~~
dogma1138
An electromagnetic launcher isn't the way to go not from earth, especially if
you want to put people into orbit.

Forget about the energy required, forget about the electromagnetic field and
what it can do the payload even non-biological one.

An electromagnetic launcher is effectively a canon, calculate the acceleration
needed to achieve orbital velocity not to mention escape velocity and you'll
get to a point where you can't have anything surviving the launch. Not to
mention that achieving Max-Q effectively on the launch pad is both the least
effective thing you can do as well as the most dangerous one.

~~~
jsprogrammer
Acceleration over 200km will get you to orbit. The electricity required for a
single launch is measured in US pennies.

An aerodynamic vehicle could be extremely safe; in the event of a failure, you
could just glide back to the ground. The possibility of violent explosion
would be practically non-existent.

~~~
kragen
LEO is -29.8 MJ/kg - -62.6 MJ/kg = 32.8 MJ/kg
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_speed#Tangential_veloc...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_speed#Tangential_velocities_at_altitude))
so one tonne is 32.8 GJ. At US$0.04/kWh (a common benchmark wholesale price
for electrical energy in the US, usually stated as US$40/MWh) that works out
to US$364, which is thirty-six thousand pennies.

What are you launching, a sparrow?

Also, doing it over only 200 km will require at least 16.7 gees. That's not
survivable for people. (Or probably sparrows either.)

Calculations in units(1) format in case I got something wrong (should the
delta-specific-energy really be 32.8 MJ/kg rather than, say, 24 to 30?):

    
    
        (-29.8 - -62.6) MJ/kg * 1 tonne * US$ 0.04 / kWh
        (-29.8 - -62.6) MJ/kg / 200 km / gravity

~~~
jsprogrammer

        m=10,000kg
        a=90m/s^2
        vf=7500m/s
        vi=0
    
        F=ma
        W=Fd
        P=W(t^-1)
    
        t=(vf-vi)/a
        d=(vf-vi)^2/(2a)
    
        t=7500/90
         ~83.33s
    
        d=7500^2/180
         =312,500m
    
        F=10000(90)
         =900,000N
    
        W=900000(312,500)
         =281,250,000,000J
    
        P=90(281250000000)/7500
         =3,375,000,000W
    
         3,375,000kW * ((7500 / 90) / 3600 s/hr) = 78,125 kWh
         78,125 kWh * $0.04/kWh = $3,125 / launch
    
         10,000 kg/launch / 3,125 $/launch = 3.2 kg/$ = $0.3125/kg
    

Looks very close to your numbers. I maintain my claim.

~~~
dsp1234
_The electricity required for a single launch is measured in US pennies._

 _78,125 kWh x $0.04 /kWh = $3,125 / launch_

 _I maintain my claim._

The two claims above are incompatible.

~~~
jsprogrammer
$ is a unit of pennies

    
    
        $=100p
    

The calculation above was for a 10Mg payload. Payloads up to 3.2kg would cost
under 100p under the same assumptions.

~~~
dogma1138
Your calculation is very very incorrect, not the math, but the concept you are
missing too many variables.

The US navy actually is building railguns, their efficiency is very very low
due to the resistance from inductance it seems that if we go the the equations
for railguns your 200KM EM gun cannot be built.

Overall the US is designing a 64MJ railgun, this gun can't put anything into
orbit, it will have a range of about 20 miles, the ship that is going to be
equipped with it is going to have a 78MW power plant and while it can power a
single rail gun it will not be able to power multiple ones. By the US Navy's
own calculations it would require 28MW to launch a projectile at 32MJ which
which means yeah.... these figures are all off by orders of magnitude.

It seems there is much more to railguns than classical mechanics.

~~~
jsprogrammer
I believe the barreled design to be fatally flawed. An earthquake or other
disruption during launch could be catastrophic to the vehicle. Much better for
the vehicle to ride next to the track; in failure scenarios, the vehicle can
simply detach and glide back to earth.

Yes, it means you have to go through the atmosphere, but it doesn't take far
to clear. That will effect the calculations some, but not much. What will
really effect the calculations though, is the cost of electricity. Generation
costs will surely drop below $0.04.

Further, transmission loss can be almost entirely mitigated by generating and
supplying the required power on-track.

Launches in favorable conditions (moon and/or planet alignments) would
probably make some launches even cheaper. Of course, if the launcher were
operating continuously, the savings would be used up during unfavorable
conditions.

~~~
kragen
You're suggesting that we should magnetically levitate the launch vehicle in
free air above a track running along the ground? That seems like it makes the
problem a lot harder — instead of having to push it through just the air
between here and space, which is about ten tonnes per cross-sectional square
meter, you're pushing it through another two or three hundred kilometers of
air, which is about another 200 tonnes of air per square meter. You know that
shroud of plasma surrounding a re-entering spacecraft? That's the power
required to push an orbital-speed object through air — but in that case
without even maintaining velocity, let alone rapidly accelerating, and in that
case it's the rarefied air of the stratosphere. You're proposing to do that
for the majority of the track. That seems like a bad idea.

Yes, generation costs will likely drop significantly below US$0.04/kWh
eventually. But that's a Kardashev-Type-1 kind of event. Generating the power
on-track may not turn out to be less expensive than long-distance
transmission, because it depends on things like sunlight availability. Of the
few suitable sites, most are pretty cloudy on one side.

No moon or planet alignments significantly reduce the energy barrier to get to
orbit.

~~~
jsprogrammer
The track would not run along the ground. You'd want to get height as quickly
as possible to minimize atmosphere and track length.

Originating somewhere around Mojave and launching towards Las Vegas could
work.

Alternatively, you may want to launch over the ocean for safety reasons, but
it seems like you may be subject to more weather concerns.

~~~
kragen
You don't want to run the track along the ground? Where then, on a dirigible
at the mesopause as suggested in
[http://postbiota.org/pipermail/tt/2011-August/009613.html](http://postbiota.org/pipermail/tt/2011-August/009613.html)?

~~~
jsprogrammer
Bouyant structures could be used, as well as wings, to suspend the track.

You can't run along the ground because you don't want to go too fast through
atmosphere.

------
ufmace
Makes me think of this other Ars story:
[http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/we-love-spacex-and-
we...](http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/we-love-spacex-and-we-hope-it-
reaches-mars-but-we-spacex-to-focus/)

I'm glad these guys are making waves in getting stuff to space, but maybe they
should focus on getting one or two people to LEO, which none of them have even
tried to do yet, before they start thinking about colonizing other planets.

~~~
Kadin
> but maybe they should focus on getting one or two people to LEO

That seems to be exactly what they're working on. The fact that they may have
ambitions beyond that doesn't mean that they're not working on the immediate
problems. They are not conflicting objectives.

Although if I was a private space-launch company, I don't know if I would
really be working on man-rated spacecraft at all. It seems like too much risk.
You can blow up a lot of unmanned payloads and nobody (other than your
insurance carrier) will bat an eye; blow up a couple of astronauts and you're
probably out of business. I'd want to stay in the cargo delivery business as
long as possible, and leave the man-rated stuff to deep-pocketed governments,
so that I could continue developing new propulsion systems without the
necessary conservatism that a man-rated system requires.

~~~
charlesdenault
Serious question: what will the tolerance be for loss of human lives when
crewed flights start? While it's entirely different, government space programs
have endured many [0].

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-
related_ac...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-
related_accidents_and_incidents#Astronaut_fatalities_during_spaceflight)

------
GoToRO
I really like this rocket because you can see with the naked eye that it is
really stable. They designed powerful enough engines, good enough software to
keep it very stable. When you watch a SpaceX landing it's like watching a
sports event: you wish more than you are certain.

~~~
shepardrtc
Your comparison isn't a proper one. The SpaceX landings that you're talking
about are very, very different from the Blue Origin landings. Once Bezos
starts putting things into orbit, then we can start comparing properly.

~~~
daedalus_j
It's amazing to me that people don't understand this. Lumping all rocketry
together is a rather grave mistake. Yes, it's all hard, yes they all can
explode, but the current Blue Origin landings are the equivalent of tossing a
dart and hitting a bullseye across the room, while the current SpaceX landings
are tossing a dart, hitting a bullseye in the next room, where the board is
strapped to a dog standing on a skateboard, and in the meantime having your
dart deploy a second smaller dart that has it's own bullseye to hit. They're
just not comparable at all.

I'm a fan of any company that wants to get people off this rock cheaply and
safely, but Blue Origin has a long way to go to achieve what SpaceX is doing.
I can't wait to see that thing fly though. :-D

