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posted by martyb on Saturday June 17 2017, @04:22PM   Printer-friendly
from the vision-and-a-plan dept.

Elon Musk has published a plan to colonize Mars using as many as 1,000 Interplanetary Transport System spaceships to transport a million settlers at a cost of $200,000 per person:

Elon Musk has put his Mars-colonization vision to paper, and you can read it for free.

SpaceX's billionaire founder and CEO just published the plan, which he unveiled at a conference in Mexico in September 2016, in the journal New Space. Musk's commentary, titled "Making Humanity a Multi-Planetary Species," is available for free [DOI: 10.1089/space.2017.29009.emu] [DX] on New Space's website through July 5.

"In my view, publishing this paper provides not only an opportunity for the spacefaring community to read the SpaceX vision in print with all the charts in context, but also serves as a valuable archival reference for future studies and planning," New Space editor-in-chief (and former NASA "Mars czar") Scott Hubbard wrote in a statement.

[...] ITS rockets will launch the spaceships to Earth orbit, then come back down for a pinpoint landing about 20 minutes later. And "pinpoint" is not hyperbole: "With the addition of maneuvering thrusters, we think we can actually put the booster right back on the launch stand," Musk wrote in his New Space paper, citing SpaceX's increasingly precise Falcon 9 first-stage landings.

Also at The Guardian.


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  • (Score: 2) by jmorris on Saturday June 17 2017, @07:14PM (26 children)

    by jmorris (4844) on Saturday June 17 2017, @07:14PM (#527109)

    Do the math people. 200K per head transport cost for a million people gets $200B I seriously doubt he is going to find a million paying passengers so where does the money come from? His only source of revenue is skimming excess market cap and green government subsidies from Tesla. Yea that is funding the early stages of a space program but does anyone think he can launder $200B from Tesla to SpaceX?

    And those numbers are just to dump warm bodies on the ground on Mars. For the first few decades they will need deliveries of pretty much any manufactured good. That is a LOT of tonnage of computers, industrial tools, flatscreen TVs, smartphones, etc. A side effect of the high transport cost will be a need to design a whole line of consumer products with 10-20+ year expected service life. If that happens I hope we Earthers are allowed to buy it.

    Then add in the fact few think we are going to get away with direct from Earth to Mars with no extensive infrastructure in LEO, the Moon, Lunar orbit, etc. Mars is an Apollo style attempt to get ahead of the tech for a splashy demo, it isn't ready for a regular passenger service mission profile.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 17 2017, @07:28PM (8 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 17 2017, @07:28PM (#527113)

    A modest proposal -- why not colonize Mars like England colonized Australia? Divert the cost of long term incarceration and send the miscreants to Mars.

    • (Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:22PM (7 children)

      by frojack (1554) on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:22PM (#527167) Journal

      Australia wasn't a death sentence. Neither was North America (Not even Roanoke).

      Mars is. There's no hope of achieving self sufficiency.

      "Transportation" as it was called wasn't always something the prisoners objected to. Free land in a warm continent had a lot of appeal to someone in a stone cold british prison or living on the streets.

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 17 2017, @11:49PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 17 2017, @11:49PM (#527206)

        Not necessarily, but to not be a death trap they'll need to set up a big nuclear reactor with a lot of fuel, and a massive amount of equipment. They also must have successful artificial hydroponics working flawlessly.

      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday June 18 2017, @11:13AM (5 children)

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday June 18 2017, @11:13AM (#527424) Journal

        Mars is. There's no hope of achieving self sufficiency.

        You do realize that Mars has all the elements in sufficient abundance, including trace elements that life on Earth needs to survive and manufacturing needs to succeed? That's the only physical restriction to achieving self sufficiency.

        • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 18 2017, @04:10PM (4 children)

          by kaszz (4211) on Sunday June 18 2017, @04:10PM (#527504) Journal

          You need to bootstrap that industrial base. That's where it becomes hard.

          • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 19 2017, @01:47AM (3 children)

            by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 19 2017, @01:47AM (#527680) Journal
            Hard isn't impossible. I think we should avoid conflating the merely hard with the truly impossible. Since there is nothing physically impossible about living on Mars - we've already figured out ways to do so with pressurized habitats and underground structures made of normal materials used on Earth today, for example. At that point, it becomes a hard problem rather than an impossible death sentence, and a matter of sufficient ingenuity, effort, and resources.
            • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday June 19 2017, @04:06AM (2 children)

              by kaszz (4211) on Monday June 19 2017, @04:06AM (#527718) Journal

              I did not say impossible. Just hard. Sure it can be done. But it will require a lot of initial funding. It may be extremely profitable once it gets going on its own. But until then it will require a sustained pipeline of money converted into fuel, research and equipment. I also think the priority has to be on facilities that can regenerate what the colony needs to subsist.

              The possibility to mine, process and build things in space using solar power also built with in situ materials will likely let loose another industrial boom. It would enable building big space objects like a Stanford torus, high purity materials, special crystals, deep space astronomy, physics research, ability to process toxic substances because there will be no water transporting it around etc.

              Some data that are missing is:
                * How does low gravity affect humans?
                * What substances are present in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter? (fissile material would be a boon for power)
                * What is present beneath the surface, on say Mars? or the Moon? Asteroids?

              • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 19 2017, @12:10PM (1 child)

                by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 19 2017, @12:10PM (#527864) Journal

                I did not say impossible.

                frojack did.

                Other data that is missing is what sort of treatment will be needed to remove toxins from Martian soil. There was some indications from the Mars Exploration Rovers, for example, that some soils may have high concentrations of chromium in them. That would need to be removed, if the soil were to be used for agriculture. And how harmful, long term exposure to much higher background radiation is.

                • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday June 19 2017, @05:30PM

                  by kaszz (4211) on Monday June 19 2017, @05:30PM (#528040) Journal

                  I think I read or saw some technique to reliable clean the Martian soil from perchĺorates. For chromium, I have no idea. But I'll suspect it's a lot harder.

  • (Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday June 17 2017, @07:29PM (2 children)

    by PiMuNu (3823) on Saturday June 17 2017, @07:29PM (#527115)

    $200k can buy (i) a tiny house in Western Europe (ii) accommodation on Mars. Folks are presumably planning to give up their worldly possessions anyway, so it isnt out of the question to spend the money on the ticket.

    • (Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:24PM (1 child)

      by frojack (1554) on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:24PM (#527169) Journal

      Seriously, I don't believe you've thought this through.
      What "tiny house" do they live in on mars? Where to they plant their garden? What do they breath?

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday June 18 2017, @03:31AM

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday June 18 2017, @03:31AM (#527306) Journal

        What "tiny house" do they live in on mars? Where to they plant their garden? What do they breath?

        Sounds like you're channeling Quantum Apostrophe, a notorious troll of this stuff on Slashdot. First, Mars has a land area similar to the entire Earth's non-water surface. So there's plenty of space for "tiny houses", which would, of course, be built by the people living there. Similarly, there's plenty of places for a garden to be grown and greenhouses could again be built by the people growing the food. As to what they would breathe, it'd be the same chemicals we breath on Earth. It's not hard to extract, oxygen, nitrogen, and even argon from the Martian atmosphere. One would then pressurize the habitats so that the resulting atmosphere would be at pressures that people could live at.

  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:04PM (1 child)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:04PM (#527124)

    $200K is pretty cheap to get rid of recidivist prisoners, the US should consider sponsoring their trips, and we have well over a million in jail - in Texas alone.

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:53PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:53PM (#527182)

      Mars... The black planet

  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:07PM (4 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:07PM (#527125)

    >That is a LOT of tonnage of computers, industrial tools, flatscreen TVs, smartphones, etc.

    Sorry, computers, flatscreens, smartphones - these are not my first concern when I go on a camping trip. Food, shelter, oh and breathable air and potable water - those are up near the top of the list.

    >a need to design a whole line of consumer products with 10-20+ year expected service life. If that happens I hope we Earthers are allowed to buy it.

    I wouldn't call it a "need" - but it would make more sense for Mars and Earth. My 70 year old mother and I were lamenting how you used to be able to buy towels that last 20+ years (as evidenced by the old towels we have still in service) while anything new from the stores is in shreds within 2 years or less.

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]
    • (Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:16PM (3 children)

      by PiMuNu (3823) on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:16PM (#527126)

      What is she doing to her towels??

      • (Score: 2) by leftover on Sunday June 18 2017, @12:56AM (2 children)

        by leftover (2448) on Sunday June 18 2017, @12:56AM (#527234)

        Ordinary laundering will do it. Today's towels, like today's nearly everything, are complete shit compared to the products 50 and more years ago. This from personal observation, not hearsay.

        --
        Bent, folded, spindled, and mutilated.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 18 2017, @04:06PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 18 2017, @04:06PM (#527501)

          Socks, underwear and plastics too. Maybe it's a result of those "degradable" campaigns that actually means more crap ends up in the ocean (because it falls apart into tiny pieces that eventually get washed into the ocean).

          The plastic toys from the 1970s seem to last quite long: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1972-Vintage-Fisher-Price-966-Little-People-Airport-Helicopter-Trams-Cars-/272713134464 [ebay.com]

          I've one of those and it might last longer than me :).

          Whereas many plastic toys from more recent era seem to get "powdery" and eventually disintegrate...

          • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday June 18 2017, @05:00PM

            by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday June 18 2017, @05:00PM (#527523)

            The powdering effect lets the lead out where it can be ingested by the children. You know that these toys are all imported from China now, right?

            --
            🌻🌻 [google.com]
  • (Score: 2) by legont on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:50PM (3 children)

    by legont (4179) on Saturday June 17 2017, @08:50PM (#527143)

    It currently takes $1.25 millions to execute a prisoner in the US. Why can't we send them all to Mars? After all, the Australian experiment turned out rather well.

    --
    "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 18 2017, @12:53AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 18 2017, @12:53AM (#527230)

      Because authoritarian assclowns will demand that degenerate criminal scum produce profit for Earth and it will turn into a Heinlein novel

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 18 2017, @12:55AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 18 2017, @12:55AM (#527233)

        Also the ACLU will sue the shit out of them

    • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 18 2017, @05:55AM

      by kaszz (4211) on Sunday June 18 2017, @05:55AM (#527365) Journal

      Do you think other Mars travelers will put up with them?

  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:05PM (1 child)

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Saturday June 17 2017, @10:05PM (#527162) Journal

    Considering this:

    http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/04/140422-mars-mission-manned-cost-science-space/ [nationalgeographic.com]

    $80-100 billion for a few people vs. $200 billion for a million.

    $20 billion per head is affordable for governments. $200,000 is accessible to dentists and defense contractors.

    --
    [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
    • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 18 2017, @06:17AM

      by kaszz (4211) on Sunday June 18 2017, @06:17AM (#527372) Journal

      Defense contractors, yummy. Just what Mars needs ;)

  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday June 18 2017, @05:06PM

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday June 18 2017, @05:06PM (#527525)

    Try this math on for size: Say the program costs $350B, because nobody ever hits their cost targets. It's also going to run for 20+ years, at least 10 launch cycles, probably more, but let's stop at 20. $350B is $1000 from every citizen of the USA, and it's also spread over 20 years, so that's around-about $1 per week from every US citizen in "Mars tax."

    The current US defense budget is around $600B PER YEAR, or closer to $1700 per citizen, or $33 per week.

    Me, personally, if there were a reasonable 20 year plan to get 1 million people to Mars (alive, and self-sustaining), I'd certainly approve a 3% rollback in US defense spending for that. If we can get the EU, Japan, South Korea and a few others in on the game, it can probably be more like a 2% rollback, if not - then we've got a 100% US based colony on Mars, doing who knows what for weapons development, within 50 years they can probably be precision-dropping asteroids on "trouble spots" around Earth.

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]