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0 pointsrunako16d ago0 comments

The stated reason SpaceX and others are talking about doing the near-impossible (orbital datacenters) for astronomical sums is that they are unable to do what e.g. Digital Realty does as its core business.

Conventional wisdom is that building datacenters is easy, but maybe the CW is wrong on this? If it were easy, companies would not be talking about spending $1500+/kg to put datacenters in orbit. Note that they assume they can get the chips either way, they just need somewhere to run them and they are saying it will be easier to get them orbital than to literally do what Digital Realty does now.

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narrator16d ago· 1 in thread

The main problem is that nobody is building new power except China. In space solar panels are 5x more efficient and run 24/7 and you don't need the kind of permits you need to build on earth. That, and you've got NGOs funded by China connected billionaires that relentlessly sue to stop data centers and new power in the United States, and you don't have to deal with that B.S in space because it's federally regulated and there isn't any environmental impact to sue over.

runakoOP13d ago

> nobody is building new power except China

Really out of intellectual curiosity, do you know where this falsehood originated? Obviously new power generation is being built all over the world (US adding 86 GW this year, for example[1]), much of it solar. But I keep seeing this persistent claim.

1 - https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=67205

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